Notices of Memsirs—Henry O. Forbes. 225 
lake and forms the tongue of Hurden, about two miles in length and 
less than half a mile in width. The peculiarly coarse sand and fine 
gravel which is extensively quarried in this locality and is found at no 
other point of the lake, affords unmistakable evidence of this being 
the former outlet of the river. In the course of subsequent dislo- 
cations in the upper strata, the old bed was barred, and the river 
scooped out a new bed through the molasse and nagelfluh of the 
Albis range of hills, parallel and in close proximity to the lake. 
The Sihl falls into the Limmat about a mile below the outflow of 
the latter from the lake, and has an average flow of about one million 
tons per day, equal to one-eighth of that of the Limmat, although, 
when in flood, it exceeds at times the mean water volume of the 
latter. It follows that when the drainage area of the Sihl still 
formed part of that of the lake of Zurich, the latter must have 
covered a much larger superficial area than it does now, and that 
this area had not only a higher level but must have probably extended 
some twelve miles below Zurich, viz. to the neighbourhood of Baden, 
where the valley abruptly narrows into a defile of about two miles 
in length, through which the Limmat rushes to its confluence with 
the Aare and Reuss at Turgi with a considerable fall. 
ISO) angers) (ag AVaMeEOstiIsSr 
T1.—Tur ANTARCTIC CONTINENT. 
NDER the title of “‘The Chatham Islands: their relation to a 
former Antarctic Continent,” Mr. Henry O. Forbes, F.R.G.S., 
read a most interesting paper before the Royal Geographical Society, 
illustrated by maps and figures, in which he gave an admirable 
account of the Chatham Islands, which lie on the extreme verge of 
the 180° meridian and 500 miles east of Port Lyttelton, in the south 
island of New Zealand. Wharekauri, the largest of the group, ts 
36 miles long, in an east and west direction, and 27 miles broad, 
from north to south; while Rangiauria, the next biggest, is 9 miles 
long by 6 miles wide. Since 1840, when they were visited and 
described by Dr. Dieffenbach, on behalf of the New Zealand Com- 
pany (see Journ. R. Geogr. Sec. vol. xi. 1841), ‘now half a century 
ago, considerable changes have taken place in the outward aspect of 
the islands. The more or less extensive forests that grew on many 
parts of the land have to a great extent disappeared to make place 
for sheep pastures or cultivated fields. The Morioris, or original 
inhabitants of the Archipelago, whose ranks first thinned by an 
incursion of Maoris from New Zealand, who for the express purpose 
of feeding on them had themselves transported thither, have all but 
vanished, and only a family or two now remain of a race that within 
the next decade or so will have to be numbered with the Tasmanians 
and with the wonderful birds that once inhabited with them this 
isolated spot of land. The Maoris, who since that incursion have 
possessed, by right-of seizure, I suppose, a considerable part of the 
land, are also fast decreasing in number through disease and drink. 
DECADE II.—yOL. X.—NO, Y. 16 
