198 Physical Geography of 



and other regions, it is clear that the lowering of the snow line does 

 not depend on the mean temperature of the year, but on the low 

 temperature of the summer. The mean summer temperature in Christ- 

 church in 1874 was 62 deg., and in Hokitika 58*9 deg., the difference in 

 favour of the east coast being without doubt attributable to the clear 

 and cloudless sky we so often enjoy during summer. Thus, the over- 

 cast atmosphere, in combination with the far greater rainfall, accounts 

 for such a lowering of the snow-line on the western side of the Alps, 

 when compared with the eastern slopes. 



However, this deficiency of the Hokitika summer temperature is 

 more than compensated in the winter, when, in Hokitika, in 1874, it 

 was registered as 45'8 against 42 6 in Christchurch, the difference 

 being 3 "2 degrees ; this fact thus fully confirming my previous opinion 

 as given in 1865, when no corresponding observations had as yet been 

 made at the West Coast. I may here add that the annual mean 

 temperature was 52*6 in Christchurch, and 53 8 in Hokitika, or 1'2 

 higher at the West Coast during that year. The position of the 

 Francis Joseph glacier is about 43 deg. 35 min., corresponding in the 

 Northern Hemisphere with that of Montpelier, Pau, and Marseilles 

 in France, and Leghorn in Italy, where the orange and lemon tree, 

 the vine and the fig tree, are covered with juicy fruits, and where 

 palm trees raise their graceful crown into the balmy air. Even 

 in the European Alps, which lie some degrees further north, the 

 average altitude of the terminal face of the larger glaciers is about 

 4000 feet, whilst we have to go twenty degrees more to the north, till 

 we find, in Norway, glaciers descending to the same low position as 

 the glacier under consideration, and to about 67 deg. north, according 

 to Leopold von Buch, before the terminal face reaches the sea; 

 consequently more than 20 deg. more towards the Pole than in the 

 Southern Hemisphere, in Terra del Euego. 



All the principal meteorological phenomena encountered in the 

 European Alps, and which have been described and explained 

 so differently, according to the point of view taken by each writer 

 individually, also occur here, the nor'-wester of New Zealand (equa- 

 torial current) being simply the fohn of Switzerland or sirocco of Italy. 

 As formerly pointed out, the snow-fields and glaciers of the Southern 

 Alps, when compared with those of Europe, are of much larger 

 dimensions, especially if we take the altitude of the mountains into 

 due consideration. That they were formerly of still more gigantic 

 proportions is, amongst other indications, well shown by the line of 



