W. Travers. — Supposed Pleistocene Glaciation of Few Zealand. 411 



question with the words " Causes of the pleistocene glaciation of New 

 Zealand." For convenience of future reference I have numbered the several 

 paragraphs as they occur in the report ; they are as follows : — 



" Causes of the Pleistocene Glaciation of New Zealand. 



(1.) " During the tertiary period, the Southern Island of New Zealand 

 was repeatedly submerged, and extensive strata of calcareous, tufaceous, and 

 argillaceous sandstones, greensands, marls, limestones, and shale, with beds of 

 lignite, were deposited. The country emerging again, the physical feature was 

 a high mountain chain, plateau-like, but with depressions existing before the 

 tertiary submergence, but now partly obliterated, running generally either on 

 the junction of two formations, on the lines of faults, or on the break of bold 

 anticlinal folds. ' - 



(2.) " As soon as the country had risen so high as to reach the line of 

 perpetual snow, the accumulation of n6v6s began, which were the more 

 considerable as glaciers and large rivers had not yet begun their task of ridge 

 making in contradistinction to the action of waves and currents of the sea on 

 submerged lands, which tends to wear off all eminences, filling the submarine 

 valleys with the debris. 



(3.) "The configuration of the area now forming the Canterbury plains 

 would have been a broad arm or channel of the sea running along cliffs of 

 tertiary rocks from Timaru to Double Corner, and surrounding Banks 

 Peninsula as an island. The waters derived from atmospheric sources had 

 already begun, during the emergence of the land, to open an outlet for 

 themselves from the higher regions by clearing the natural watercourses, but 

 had only in a minor degree attacked the tertiary strata, filling the valleys in 

 favourable localities as high as 4000 feet above the level of the sea. 



The n6v6s, considering the insular and peculiar position of New Zealand- 

 its principal range or back-bone running from S.W. to N.E., thus lying at 

 a right angle to the two prevailing air currents, the equatorial north-west 

 and the polar south-east, both bringing moisture with them — would soon have 

 attained an enormous extent, and would have considerably lowered the line of 

 perpetual snow, even had not the land been raised to a higher elevation than 

 at present. The consequence would have been that glaciers of much larger 

 extent would have descended down the natural outlets, grinding down the 

 rugosities of bottom and sides. 



(4.) " The action of the glaciers beginning to lay open the rocks of the 

 higher ranges, would soon offer sufficient material for moraine accumu- 

 lations, first on the glaciers themselves, and afterwards at their terminal 

 faces. 



(5.) " The scooping action of the ice having once begun to eat into the 

 plateau-like range, not only in the main course of the glaciers, but also in the 



