MEETINGS OF SOCIETIES. 579 
introduced? It was suggested it might have been introduced by 
the earliest navigators—perhaps by Tasman—and that the earliest 
rats and latest moas existed together. | 
The President considered that what had been said proved that 
this interesting point in the natural history of New Zealand was 
far from being satisfactorily settled, and hoped that no time would 
be lost in collecting authentic information on the subject from Na- 
tives, before it was too late. 
4. Dr. Hector made some interesting remarks in reference to 
what he had said at/a previous meeting, that the tidal disturbances 
felt on these shores about the time of the Sunda eruptions were 
due to their influence. The editor of the NEw Zeatanp JouRNAL 
OF SciENCE had objected that, as the great Australian continent 
intervened directly between the Straits of Sunda and New Zea- 
land, no tidal wave from that cause could have been felt here 
without being felt much more forcibly along the western and 
southern shores of Australia and Tasmania, and suggested that 
the disturbances were propably due to other submarine movements 
in the Pacific. Late reports showed that the tidal movements 
were very marked on the west coast of Tasmania, and the disturb- 
ances felt herejwere found to coincide suggestively with the succes- 
sion of earthquake shocks that followed the eruption at Sunda. 
The retardation or acceleration of the tidal swell by those earth- 
quake shocks would act and re-act in various directions, thereby 
causing disturbances of varying intensity on all the shores of these 
islands. An extraordinary phenomenon to which he particularly 
drew attention was that atmospheric disturbances, as registered by 
a delicately suspended barometer coincided remarkably in the 
sudden jerks on several days with the recorded eruptions at Sunda, 
beginning on the evening of August 27th, and recurring on four or 
five days. These barometrical jerks and curves were exhibited by 
diagram, with dates and hours given; and Dr. Hector moreover 
showed that these readings in Wellington corresponded with simi- 
lar jerks in the curves recorded by a self-registering barometer at 
Dunedin, showing that they were produced by a fast-moving in- 
fluence that traversed the atmosphere quite independently of the 
ordinary cyclonic movements that were in progress. 
OTAGO INSTIEUTE. 
Dunedin, September 11th, 1883. A. Montgomery, Esq., Presi- 
deut, in the chair 
Papers 1.—‘* The Lower Harbour and Bar of Otago,” by G. 
M. Barr, M.I.C.E. In 1844, Colonel Wakefield stated that there 
was no bar at the entrance to Otago Harbour, and the report of 
the survey by Captain Wing of the ‘‘ Deborah,” at the same time, 
represented that the banks inside the entrance were of inconsider- 
able extent, and had 34 fathoms all over them at low water. It was 
also stated that a channel with 18 feet of water existed all the way 
to the top of the Harbour. Another account, by an old whaler 
who was here 55 years ago, stated that no banks dry at low water 
existed between the islands and the heads. On the other hand, 
the sailing directions of Mr. Charles Kettle, a year or two later, 
make mention of both the outer and the inner bars, and there is 
also the fact that the ‘‘ Royal Albert,” drawing 20 feet 6 inches 
