Geological Survey of Canterbury. 41 



remarkable. On the eastern side dense forest, with deep valleys and 

 gorges, in which small but splendid waterfalls come down like so many 

 moving ribbons of silver j on the western, rocky walls, mostly naked 

 and nearly perpendicular, many thousand feet high, scarcely ever 

 offering room for the unchequered growth of alpine vegetation. The 

 summit of this stupendous wall is covered with a sheet of snow thirty 

 or more feet thick, but mostly too steep to allow the formation even 

 of small glaciers on that side, which therefore descend towards the 

 western valley. Near the river, and at some few localities of an 

 easier gradient, I met with numerous remains of avalanches fallen 

 during the end of winter and spring, and showing the enormous 

 quantity of snow which must accumulate here to withstand the melting 

 process of several months, during which the sun is particularly powerful 

 in these deep alpine valleys. About a mile from the head of the valley, 

 it was no longer possible to travel on horseback, owing to the 

 enormous blocks by which the river-bed was strewn, I therefore con- 

 tinued on foot, and soon stood at the terminal face of the main glacier, 

 which comes principally from the south-eastern slopes of the Moorhouse 

 range ; whilst another branch unites with it at the foot of the gigantic 

 rocky wall which divides it from the Mueller glacier — this latter branch 

 descends f l* om the high range lying between the bed of the Tasman 

 river and that of the river under review. 



A second glacier descending into the valley a little below the 

 former, owing to its peculiar form, narrowed in the middle to a mere 

 thread of ice, and expanding in both directions, was named the Hour- 

 glass glacier by me ; its terminal face lies 3,816 feet above the sea. 

 The nights now became rather cold, the thermometer, before the sun 

 rose to a considerable height, generally standing below freezing point, 

 sometimes as low as 20 degrees ; but the weather was really magni- 

 ficent, and we had bright days with a deep blue sky, and scarcely a 

 cloud visible. On April 28th we retraced our steps, and then 

 ascended the other western branch, which I named the Hopkins. In 

 order to do so, we had to follow the Dobson nearly a mile down the 

 main valley where both rivers flow a considerable distance side by side, 

 so that we might avoid the swampy ground which, in addition to 

 quicksands, offered us a serious obstacle to crossing nearer to the 

 dividing range between both rivers. The ascent of the Hopkins which, 

 when the river is low, does not offer any difficulty, reveals with every 

 mile new and beautiful views. The mountains for more than a 

 thousand feet are here covered with fine beech forests, above which 



