Canterbury and Westland. 407 



CHAPTER XVI. 



THE QUATERNARY AND RECENT PERIODS.* 



(A) Eirst Appeabance or Man in this Island. 



It has already been pointed out that no exact boundary can be drawn 

 between the Great Grlacier, and the Quaternary periods, that in fact it 

 is impossible to say, when the former ceased and the latter began. 

 The same can be said still more truly of the era during which the 

 Loess beds were deposited, the process of their formation still going 

 on uninterruptedly at the present time. However one natural division 

 might be proposed for New Zealand, namely to begin the Quaternary 

 period there, where we meet the first sign of the presence of man. 

 This line of division is however one liable to be shifted further back 

 in course of time, when more discoveries in our younger beds are 

 made, the results of extensive railway and road cuttings, well sinking, 

 and mining operations, by which our knowledge in that respect will 

 greatly be advanced in years to come. Or should, as it is not impos- 

 sible, man already have lived in New Zealand during the latter part of 

 the Great G-lacier period, this proposed division would be no more of 

 any value, and another more constant one would have to be adopted. 



* In this chapter I hare included the recent period, during which, by the different agencies inces- 

 santly at work upon our globe, new deposits are in course of formation. This was the more 

 necessary, as the recent accumulations blend in many instances so thoroughly with those of 

 quaternary age, that it would be impossible to draw a line of demarcation. 



