456 
THE GEOLOGY OE NEW ZEALAND. 
masses of mountains bad fallen, and in many places tlie trees 
might be seen under water. 
From these circumstances, it is evident that parts of the 
Middle Island are rapidly rising, and of this fact there are 
other proofs to be adduced. Coal measures appear at 
Massacre Bay and Molyneux River, intermingled with 
abundance of Kauri resin, this noble pine is not now found 
growing within ten degrees of latitude north of that river; 
in no single spot within that wide range is a Kauri tree 
to be met with ; hence we conclude that the climate has 
considerably altered, since that carboniferous deposit was 
made ; but it is not necessary to go back to that probably 
remote period ; the Kauri resin is still found on the surface 
of the land, with every appearance of its having had quite as 
recent an origin as that picked up in the north ; it is most 
probable, therefore, that the tree has grown in those latitudes 
at a comparatively recent date ; this beautiful pine does 
not seem to require heat, so much as shelter and humidity. 
If then the land was formerly low in that latitude, the cli- 
mate would necessarily be humid and mild, the cold being 
tempered by the sea, and not increased by the propinquity 
of snowy mountains ; thus the Kauri might have flourished 
there, as well as other trees, which now belong to a warmer 
climate.* 
x 
* Extract of Lieut. -Governor Eyre’s letter, describing his ascent of the Kai 
Kouras, a mountain of the Middle Island, 10,114 feet high : — 
Government House, 26th Nov. 1849. 
‘ ‘ Little vegetation on the hill, but mosses and lichens, and some coarse 
grasses, besides prickly plants, of which the ‘ Taramea ’ is the chief ; but the 
singular part was , that on so steep and high a hill , where now nothing but mosses 
and lichens grow , were the charred remains of large totara trees , evidently shew- 
ing that the ground once has been low and has been covered with forest , and that 
it has been pushed up within a comparatively recent geological period. There was 
grey granite on the highest ridge. E. Eyre. 
Rev. R. Taylor.” 
Mr. Clifford, jun., stated the same to me, and further, that the totara is not 
now to be found anywhere in the vicinity of the mountain, although there large 
trunks of totara trees, generally charred, are found beyond the region of grass, 
where nothing but moss and lichens grow ; he also said, these remarkable 
remains of trees are generally laid in lines, conveying the idea of drift timber, 
deposited on the precipitous sides of the mountain. 
