Haasr.— Address. 48 
At last, in 1860, von Baer brought forward his hypothesis that such 
changes in one particular direction could be only caused by the rotation of 
the earth, and he explained the modus operandi in the following manner :— 
Any given point at the equator makes, naturally, during the daily rotation 
of the earth, a quicker movement towards east than one in higher latitudes 
or at the pole. Now, if a body moves gradually from the equator towards 
ihe pole, it will possess a larger velocity of rotation than the ground to 
which it advances, and will move quicker towards east than the objects 
which surround it. A river in the northern hemisphere, flowing towards 
north, thus arrives in latitudes which possess a smaller velocity of rotation 
than itself. Its banks will, as it were, remain behind in the rotating 
motion, and consequently its waters will push towards east, or against the 
right bank. If, on the other hand, a river in the northern hemisphere 
flows towards south, it is evident, when its waters arrive in latitudes with 
a higher velocity of rotation, that its banks will, as it were, advance ahead 
of the water, and consequently the latter will exercise a greater pressure 
towards west, or towards the right; so that again the right bank will be 
washed away. Of course this effect will be the more powerful and conspicuous 
the more the direction of the river coincides with the meridian. It is 
natural that in the southern hemisphere the direction will be reversed, so 
that all the rivers will push towards the left. According to von Baer all 
the large Russian rivers, as for instance the Volga, Ural, Ob, and Jenessei, 
and, as von Hoehstetter states, the Danube between Vienna and Belgrade, 
show the correctness of the theory; and lately searching through the 
published accounts of travels in North America and Canada I find that 
similar observations have been made in those countries. 
'The application to our own rivers in New Zealand is also dM made, 
and shows that they conform to this law. Thus, for instance, the river 
traversing the Canterbury Plains, which flows nearest in a meridional line, 
is the Rangitata, and there, as previously observed, the difference between 
the right and left bank is most conspicuous, whilst all the other rivers 
without exception show in the same way a marked tendency to advance 
towards their left or northern banks. None of our rivers have been watched 
so continuously and anxiously as the Waimakariri, and although the 
tendency of its waters, principally during freshes, to wash its northern or left 
banks away, was well recognised, no vera causa for such direction could 
be assigned, except, as I had assumed in my report on the formation of the 
Canterbury Plains, that a small local rise of Banks Peninsula was probably 
taking place. However, as this tendency of the Waimakariri to advance 
with its waters towards the left is the outcome of a general law, and may 
be considered constant, the southern banks will every year become more 
