CRAWFORD.— Port Nicholson a Fresh-water Lake. 293 
the gravels and clays which fill the basin of this valley been deposited in the 
waters of the harbour, which, on that supposition, would then have flowed up 
the valley, remains of marine origin must have been found. 
The formation of Thorndon Flat, although difficult to account for without 
the assistance of the above theory, becomes comparatively easy when supposed 
to be a gentle deposit in a fresh-water lake. This I Suppose it to be. The more 
I consider the question the more it appears to me impossible to suppose that 
Port Nicholson could have been for ages anything else than a fresh-water lake. 
The question still remains for consideration how the basin of the lake and 
valley was originally excavated, for excavated it must have been. 
Although unwilling, without due cause, to drag in the much-abused agency 
of ice, yet I must say that I think the most reasonable theory we can form on 
the subject is, that the great work of excavation was at least commenced, and 
in great part executed, by the agency of a glacier. If we suppose a great 
elevation of land in the neighbourhood, possibly including the whole of Cook 
Strait to Taranaki and Cape Farewell, and the still, at that time, undenuded 
state of the higher parts of Tararua, it is easy to conceive, or possibly difficult 
to resist, the inference that a névé crowned the higher plateau, and a glacier 
once filled the valley of the Hutt and the harbour of Port N icholson, and so 
far excavated the valley as to prepare a basin for a lake and subsequent 
harbour. This would appear to me to be the simplest explanation of the 
changes which have taken place. It will be seen that the chief foundations 
for the theory are the peculiar denudation of the district and the boulder-bank 
in Evans Bay. With regard to the latter it is not necessary to suppose that 
the boulders were brought from a distance, for they might have been derived 
from the remains of the Evans Bay denudation. Some few boulders of granites 
and schists, which I have found on the isthmus, arrived there, no doubt, at a 
comparatively recent period, and since the re-arrangement of the boulder bank 
by the sea. 
It may seem absurd to notice a curious idea of which many people seem to 
have got hold, from what information it would be difficult to determine, viz., 
that Captain Cook sailed into Port Nicholson through the passage of Evans 
Bay. The best authority on the subject ought to be Capt. Cook himself, and, 
as he does not mention his visit to this port, it is reasonable to suppose that 
his ships never entered it. But I think I have shown conclusively that he 
could not have entered by Evans Bay, for, even supposing that the land at the 
time of his visit to New Zealand stood at a lower level of fifteen feet —which 
supposition would require an extraordinary stretch of imagination that 
depression would only allow about a foot or two of water at high tide for the 
passage of his ships, and, notwithstanding the smaller size of the vessels in 
those days, that depth of water was clearly insufficient. 
