Fifteenth Annual Report. 539 



the temperature of winter and summer, and day and night, which is so 

 characteristic of this district, is all in favour of successful cidtivation if irri- 

 gation were afforded ; and the destructive effects of the high winds might 

 easily be mitigated by the growth of plantations, as trees nourish vigorously 

 wherever there is even a small trickle of moisture. The claim of the dis- 

 trict for expenditure on water-supply therefore appears to me to be better 

 founded than in many other districts, where it would have no ultimate 

 advantage beyond the extraction of gold. 



Other parts of the Otago District were visited during January and 

 February with special objects, and the remainder of the season was spent 

 in the Taupo and Eotorua Districts on business relating to the general 

 examination of the district and particularly to the utilization of the thermal 

 springs. 



Mr. Cox was engaged during the months of October, November, 

 and December on an examination of the district lying between Col- 

 lingwood and Big Eiver, along the coast-line, and bounded to the eastward 

 by the Aorere Eiver. He reports that the well-known black slates of 

 the Perseverance Mine appear to be represented near the Golden Eidge 

 Mine at Slaty Eiver, Anatori, and at this latter locality he obtained 

 specimens of graptolites which would place these beds as Silurian in 

 age. The Golden Eidge Mine is worked in similar beds, and, not- 

 withstanding the fact that very little systematic work has been car- 

 ried on there, the reef has yielded much richly auriferous stone, and 

 would, he thinks, prove of great value if worked on a wider basis. In the 

 vicinity of Big Eiver and the Turiniawiwi he mapped the boundary of the 

 granite, which extends from Eocks Point northwards, and, occurring nearly 

 at the mouth of Big Eiver, forms a narrow strip inland, which is not seen 

 on the surface further than the Turiniawiwi, where it ends, as a conical hill, 

 at the head of Independent Creek. He further examined the coal measures, 

 eliciting little further information than was previously known ; but, from 

 the limestones which overlie the calcareous sandstones of Kaipuhe cliffs, 

 obtained bones of the giant fossil penguin, and he traced the boundaries of 

 the different members of this Cretaceo-tertiary formation. The rocks in 

 which the Golden Eidge Mine is worked appear to extend southwards 

 through Friday and Independent Creeks, and form the greater part of the 

 Wakamarama Mountains, being again met with on the Gouland Downs ; it 

 being from this district that Mr. Cox considers the auriferous cements were 

 derived which have been worked on the quartz ranges near Collingwood, 

 and which are probably contemporaneous in age with the Pliocene marls, 

 which occupy a considerable area along the present course of the Aorere 

 Eiver and form the low hills along the coast-line between Takaka and 



