84 Transactions, — Miscellaneous. 



science by providing some of the more expensive tools required, and by 

 paying scientific men, so that they might devote more of their time to 

 scientific studies. 



He can do none of these things, except at the cost of the working 

 classes ; all the wealth devoted to the work would be diverted from the 

 production of material comforts, which, if produced, they would enjoy, and 

 no one has a right to make his poorer fellow-citizens pay for anything, 

 unless he, after careful consideration aided by the best knowledge open to 

 him, is fully convinced that the privation he compels them to suffer is com- 

 pensated by the advantages they will get in exchange. 



It is not too much to say that an expenditure eaual to that represented 

 by the national debt of England would be well invested, if it could be 

 made the means of rousing the working classes of England to insist on 

 every one of their children being as well educated as might be done, with- 

 out throwing any unbearable burthen on the country. 



Art. III. — Ohserrations on the Evidences of recent Change in the Elevation of 

 the Waikato District. By James Stewart, C.E. 

 [Read before the Auckland Institute, Gtli December, 1875.] 

 That rivers are ever scooping their beds to lower levels, and eroding their 

 banks until new channels are established, are matters of common observa- 

 tion. Considering the immense weight of water in a river like the Waikato, 

 its moderately rapid current, and its course, in the lower parts, through 

 alluvial flats composed of materials of the lightest nature, it is at first sight 

 subject for wonder that the changes are not more rapid than they are. It 

 is, however, true that the lower Waikato cannot now cut its channel very 

 much deeper in a practical view, unless the laud is raised, relative to sea 

 level, because a certain definite gradient has to be preserved to carry the 

 water off to sea. But if we suppose the land to be elevated, suddenly or other- 

 Vi'ise, a great change would soon be observed in the condition of the river. 

 Falls or rapids would be established at its mouth, which, in more or less 

 time, according to the nature of the bed, would reduce the gradient to what 

 it was before. During the time this was being en'ected, the increased 

 current would have formed a new channel, sometimes coincident with the 

 old one, but often crossing and recrossing it, until, when the normal level 

 and current had again been established, the old river course would be 

 traceable as a series of lagoons or narrow Vvinding swamps, elevated above 

 the new level of the river, by as much as the land had been raised. 



