374 Transactions. —Geoloyy. 
I am further tempted to suppose a former large lake in Cook Strait, 
through which the waters of the great Cook Strait river ran. My reasons 
for this are the configuration of the land, and the absence of soundings, 
denoting a former river channel in the broad part of the Strait. The dis- 
tribution of gravel and clay, also, in what we may call the fringe of the 
west coast of the Province of Wellington, extending into Taranaki, being 
the belt of open and more level country than what exists further inland, 
shows, I think, the action either of a lake or of the sea in levelling the 
surface and distributing the deposition of the gravels and clays. But in 
this district there are found in places undoubted deposits of marine fossils, 
such as in the cliffs at Rangitikei on descending to Mr. Fox’s house, and at 
the crossing of the Parewa, so that the question requires much further 
observation and investigation. 
I am inclined to think that the large deposits of gravel and clay between 
the Manawatu and the Rangitikei, between the Rangitikei and Turakina, or 
we may say Whanganui, do not show any signs of marine fossils, except in 
one or two places, and as local changes of level may not have been unfre- 
quent in these districts it is quite possible that the bulk of the gravels and 
clays may have been lake deposits, while a local depression may have 
allowed some intermixture of marine fossils, either in Pleistocene or m 
recent times. 
There is abundant evidence that in the Province of Otago the lake 
system was formerly on a very extensive scale. The Clutha, the Taieri, and 
other rivers cut through barriers of hills or mountains, which previously 
must have remained as lakes, the waters of which poured into the upper 
basins. 
Altogether it must, I think, be admitted that lakes during Pleistocene 
and recent times have been remarkably numerous in New Zealand, and 
have performed a great amount of work in levelling and distributing the 
superficial strata. 
When we read of the small retrogression caused by the enormous rush 
of water at the falls of Niagara, and the estimates formed of the time which 
this force will take to excavate the river valley to the lake above, we may 
form some idea of the long periods of work which many New Zealand 
rivers must have had to excavate hard rock before the upper waters were 
released. 
Tam inclined to compare many New Zealand lake oi to the plains 
of Thessaly. These, with the mountains of Macedonia on the north, the 
Pindus Ranges on the west, Mount (tna, or Othrys, on the south, present 
also a mountain barrier to the east. It is more than forty years since I 
have ridden over these plains ; but when I think of the conformation of the 
