18 Tramactions. — MisceUaneoiis. 



For some years previous to 1872, the antarctic stream came loaded with 

 huge islands of ice, to an extent not witnessed hj mariners since the route 

 round Ca^oe Horn became so frec[uented a highway as it has been since the 

 gold discoveries. 



Navigation in those seas was for a time so extremely perilous that 

 insurance companies became alarmed, and many shipmasters sent their 

 vessels to struggle back against the westerly winds by the Cape of Good 

 Hope. Another great separation of bergs from their parent glaciers, an 

 occurrence which has no doubt gone on intermittently in all ages, happened 

 in 1829, as related by Su- Charles Lyell. Then, as in these late years, 

 many bergs retained the dimensions of islands when they had reached the 

 longitude of the Cape of Good Hope ; some had nearly circumnavigated 

 the globe before they foundered in Australian seas, and one was still many 

 miles in length when seen off Cape Leuwiu. An excellent opportunity was 

 aiiorded for the conveyance of seeds of the sam.e plants if any are pro- 

 duced or remain possessed of vitality in the soil of the lands from which 

 they came, to different places in their route, a possibility dwelt upon by 

 Mr. Darwin, in alluding to the sj)riniding of the same flora in far distant 

 regions; it seems probable that hal the climate been suitable, ]plants now 

 unknown there might have by this means been brought far up into 

 Australia when the land was lower, as there is evidence of bergs having 

 been drifted up in former times high into Spencer's Gulf, on the shores of which 

 large boulders of foreign rocks have been left by them. There are no data as 

 yet upon which to found a theory as to the periodicity of these occurrences, 

 which might connect the action of the main-s]3ring which sets the machinery 

 in motion, with any of the many causes, magnetic, sidereal, etc., which have 

 been proposed as influencing alternating cycles of dry and wet seasons — 

 such as the return of Biela's comet every six and a Lalf years — the time of 

 the solar spots every eleven — the twelve-year cycle supposed to have to do 

 with the long one of the revolution of the planet Jupiter, etc., etc. How- 

 ever this may be, there is every reason for believing that when polar winds 

 are more than usually chilled over certain oceanic areas, they will blow 

 with more force, and mingling with other aerial currents nearer to the 

 troj^ics than in ordinary seasons, condense their moisture. 



Australian climates would be the principal ones affected by such a 

 cause, so we find that after the great ice-stream alluded to, the following 

 years were wet ones in the then occupied part of New South Wales. 

 Again, in 1869, commenced a cycle of splendid seasons for the farmers all 

 over the Australias, dry plains were converted into lakes, and steamers 

 ascended the tributaries of the Murray more than 1,500 miles. The 

 consequences of the ice-stream were also felt in New Zealand, In 



