644 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



island of Tasmania red clover grows well, and it is now believed that 

 till the humble bee is introduced to fertilize the flowers red clover 

 will not propagate itself in New Zealand. 



On the 12th of last November I sailed from Plymouth for Mel- 

 bourne in the Orient steamer " Garonne," having arranged with 

 Ulrich Kaufmann and Emil Boss, both of Grindelwald, to follow 

 me in the next ship. Unfortunately smallpox broke out in my ship, 

 and between a delay at the Cape and quarantine at Melbourne I 

 was not able to reach New Zealand and join my men till February 

 oth. Immediately on landing I received a kincl telegram from Dr. 

 Hector, and a letter from the Minister for Railways enclosing free 

 passes on the New Zealand railways for myself and guides during our 

 stay in the Colony. I lost no time in reaching Christchurch, where 

 I spent an afternoon in Dr. Haast's company, he being the great 

 authority on the topography of the Southern Alps; and next morning 

 we started in the train for the south. On arriving at Timaru we had 

 a delay of three hours before the train left by a branch line for Albury, 

 and we occupied the time in purchasing provisions for our mountain 

 journey. As we were assured that we could get sheep right up to 

 the snows of Mount Cook, we took with us but a small supply of 

 meat in tins. Flour, meal, bread, and biscuits, formed the bulk of 

 our stores. 



On reaching Albury by rail we hired a waggon and horses, and on 

 the evening of the next day we got our first view of the great snowy 

 range. The contrast between the brown, flattened downs over which 

 we drove and the purple, ice-seamed peaks was most striking. Next 

 morning we were up betimes, as we did not know how long our jour- 

 ney might be, and our driver was unacquainted with the country 

 beyond this point. Our road soon lost itself in the rolling downs, so 

 we walked on in advance pioneering the way, and thus before midday 

 we reached the last swell overlooking the Tasman river. We had 

 now to descend about 200 feet, and again came upon the track leading 

 up the river bed. This river bed of the Tasman, over two miles wide, 

 is a broad sheet of coarse gravel, through which the river meanders 

 in countless channels, between which are often dangerous quicksands. 

 "We drove along over marshy flats, on which numerous seagulls had 

 their nests (one of the young seagulls we afterwards met high up 

 on the glacier, winging its flight over the snowy range to the west 

 coast), then across river channels, and then over wide tracts of gravel. 

 Right before us, rising abruptly from the river bed, in the point where 

 the valley forked, was the great mass of Mount Cook, its icy peak glit- 

 tering like a pinnacle of frosted silver against the deep blue sky. On 

 either side the mountains rose from the flat valley with the same 

 abruptness, and the terminal face of the Hooker and Tasman glaciers 

 closed in the end of the two branches into which the valley divided to 

 the right and left of Mount Cook. This flat river bed, with the moun- 

 tains rising from it abruptly, and from margins as sharply defined as 

 the shores of a lake, is so typical of all the mountain valleys we 



