Glacial Epoch of Australia. . 277 
terbury Plains,” Press office, Christchurch, 1864. “On the 
causes which have led to the excavation of deep lake basins 
in hard rocks, in the Southern Alps of New Zealand,” vol. 
xxi. “Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of Lon- 
don,”) treated on some of the causes by which that remark- 
able glaciation of New Zealand originated, and will therefore 
not repeat here the same arguments on which my theory has 
been based. But I wish to point out that during the glacier 
epoch in New Zealand, it is possible that Australia was also 
rising, and that thus no evidence of the fauna of that epoch 
-is accessible to us for examination ; its exuvie, and the beds 
of littoral origin formed during its duration, having been 
buried still deeper, or submerged, when the country sunk 
again towards the close of the glacier epoch. 
Therefore if we want to find evidence of a glacier epoch 
in Victoria, we must look for it in the Australian Alps, 
where morainic accumulations may have been preserved 
round the lakes, and along the valleys; and where striz, 
rocks, moutonnées, and other physical features peculiar to 
glacialised countries may be found. Although from the 
altitude of the Australian Alps, the position and extent of 
these glacial indications can be expected to be of small 
dimensions only, even if they exist at all. 
I wish once more to point out that the principal reason 
why I take the liberty to lay these few notes before the 
Royal Society of Victoria, was simply to show that all the 
observations made by me point towards the conclusion that 
no glacial epoch, during which the lowlands were buried be- 
low the sea, and rose again afterwards above it, has existed 
in post-tertiary times in New Zealand; and that con- 
sequently no beds derived from icebergs, or deposited in a 
refrigerated sea, could be open to our inspection, because this 
island during that epoch was either stationary, or was raised 
above the present sea-level. 
Of course we have no evidence of the amount of emergence 
during, and subsidence after, the glacier epoch, which may, 
however, have been of various degrees in different localities. 
. As far as ] am aware the physical features of Australia are 
in that respect similar to those of this island. 
And may we not safely assume that by such rising of the 
land in the southern seas, however slight it may have been 
in the temperate zone, an antarctic continent made its appear- 
ance, of larger dimensions than that of which the outlines 
are partly known to us; and that large islands between it 
