Geological Survey of Canterbury. 123 



found, as I was not only anxious to make a collection of these 

 interesting fossils, but I hoped also to he able to fix the horizon in 

 which they were embedded. On January 23rd (1866), I started for 

 this region, where I remained for several days occupied in making a 

 geological investigation of this highly important zone, although the 

 weather remained unsettled, and we had some trouble with the rivers 

 which continued te be high and scarcely fordable. In the geological 

 portion of this Eeport some details will be found on this district, of 

 which it can truly be said that it offers us the key to unravel the 

 relations in which our young secondary and old tertiary beds stand to 

 each other. 



Journey to the Head-watees oe the Eakaia — 1866. 



I now prepared myself for a longer journey into the Southern Alps 

 selecting the head-waters of the Eakaia for this year's campaign. 

 Starting on March the 2nd, and returning on the 18th of April, all the 

 principal source-branches of that river were examined, and the weather 

 was so fine, that during nearly seven weeks of exploration, there were 

 only two days in which I could not pursue my regular work in the 

 field. 



After having crossed the Acheron and ascended the alluvial terraces 

 deposited upon morainic and lacustrine deposits, we arrived at the 

 moraines lying across the eastern end of Lake Coleridge, a true lake 

 basin, of the formation and physical features of which I shall speak in 

 the sequel. The newly made road to Browning's Pass led across these 

 moraines and along the hills on the southern side of Lake Coleridge, 

 where well-defined glacier shelves give evidence that here — about 2000 

 feet above the present bed of the Eakaia — the whole valley was filled 

 with enormous ice-masses, which terminated only on the Canterbury 

 plains, six miles below the gorge ; extending in a semicircle from the 

 eastern base of Mount Hutt to the Malvern Hills. At some spots 

 fifteen of these glacier shelves were visible, one above the other, with 

 a fall of from 10 to 12 degrees towards the east. 



Instead of following the new road to the ferry, near G-oat Hill, I 

 descended about 450 feet by the dray-road, which leads to the stations 

 of Messrs. Palmer and Neave, on the banks of the Eakaia proper. 

 The Wilberforce, which we had to cross near its junction with the 

 Eakaia, was a little swollen from a previous north-west storm, but 



