W. Travers. — On Extinct Glaciers in the South Island. 297 



during a period of elevation, during wMch. many of the existing raised beaches 

 and auriferous leads were formed ; that continued subsidence followed the 

 close of the glacial period, and that subsidence is still continuing. 



If this is correct we must expect to find traces of ancient beaches overlaid 

 by glacial drift, and glacial drift at far lower levels than many of the beaches. 

 Of the latter there are abundant examples south of Hokitika, where the 

 morainic accumulations cover a great po'rtion of the level country, which 

 I have already described. Of the former there is an excellent example north 

 of the Buller River, where the auriferous beach drifts on the slopes of Mount 

 Eochfort are covei'ed by a large mass of sandstone boulders derived from the 

 Mount Rochfort sandstones, and evidently transported to their present position 

 by glacial action. 



In the foregoing the term " glacial period" means the last period of great 

 glacial extension. 



Art. L. — On the Extinct Glaciers of the Middle Island of New Zealand. 

 By W. T. L. Tr AVERS, F.L.S., a Governor of the New Zealand Institute. 

 [Read before the Wellinaton PMlosopMcal Society, ISi/i October, 1873.] 

 There are few points of geological interest more strikingly brought under the 

 notice of the traveller in the great mountain range of the Middle Island of 

 New Zealand, than the evidences of the former extension of a glacier system, 

 of which the numerous glaciers of the first order still occupying the valleys 

 radiating from Mount Cook are, without doubt, a continuing remnant. 

 Indeed, it is scarcely too much to say, that every great valley stretching into 

 the main range, from one end of the island to the other, aflfords unmistakable 

 proofs of having, at some time, been occupied by ice ; and it is my purpose in 

 the present paper, after making some general observation as to the bearing of this 

 fact upon other geological questions affecting both islands, to describe, in some 

 detail, the particular evidences of glacier action which are to be seen in the 

 valleys of the Buller and the Dillon, two of the largest rivers in the Province 

 of Nelson. 



Now it must be evident that the disappearance of the enormous glaciers 

 which, as will be seen in the sequel, formerly filled the upper parts of these 

 two valleys — as well as of those which occupied the valleys of the Hurunui, the 

 Waimakariri, and the Rakaia, in the Canterbury Province — must be attributed 

 either to a singular change in climate, or to a great diminution in altitude 

 above sea level of the mountain chain in question. 



Those who are curious upon the first point, as a possible cause, will find 



vl 



