Beischek. — On New Zealand Ornithology. 189 



about from north to south, underlying west, three bearing about east to 

 west underlying north intersecting each other ; all these lodes show metal 

 on the surface over 2,000 feet high. There is a valley where these lodes 

 could be got with very little difficulty, also there is plenty of water power 

 for machinery and timber for tramway, and the best anchorage in Dusky 

 Sound is right opposite Mr. Docherty's huts, from whence he has cut 

 a good track to the lodes ; also there are two tracks I have cut, No. 1 

 to the lake I have found and peak above (no name), No. 2 follows eye 

 on the left side of the sound to some succession of waterfalls. This 

 country looks very broken, but any one who is used to alpine travelling 

 could ascend the most of this mountain and also descend on the other side 

 if he looked for the ledges. I would have cut a track to Lake Manapouri, 

 but as the winter was so severe, and I have been alone, I could not venture. 

 In August I measured the ice in one of the lagoons on top of the Alps and 

 it was 6^- inches thick, but the lakes on the eastern side of Mount Huge 

 and the one I have found froze in much later. The heaviest frost I 

 experienced in July, when in one night 3 inches of ice formed. Snow was 

 lying from the 15th July to 30th September from 3 feet in depth. There 

 are many snow-drifts and ice-fields, in getting over which I had to gain 

 foothold by cutting steps with a tomahawk. I also experienced heavy snow- 

 storms during the same period, but never without being accompanied by a 

 severe thunderstorm, or vice versa. On the beach the heaviest fall of snow 

 I noticed was 6 inches, in August, but it disappeared in three days. An 

 incessant fall of rain continued during the whole winter in the low lands 

 and of snow on the Alps. From the 10th to end of April there were only 

 eight days without rain, in May only four days, in June thirteen days, in 

 July four days, in August five days, in September ten days. 



The following is a list of the species met with, against each of which I 

 have attached the word rare or common, as the case may be : — 



Hieracidea ferox ) 



. fEare all along the coast. 



, , novce-zealandia. > 



Circus gouldi. Eare in the Sounds, common from Martin's Bay. 



Athene novce-zealandice. Eare in the Sounds. 



Halcyon vagans. Very rare in the Sounds. 



Prosthemadera novte-zealandim } 



. 7 . . [Not very common m the Sounds. 



Anthornis melanura. > 



Xenicus longipes. Common in the Sounds, rare in Martin's and Jack- 

 son's Bay. 



Xenicus gilviventris. Eare. 



Acanthisitta chloris. Common everywhere. 



Qrihonyx ochrocephala. Common. 



