230 
The N.Z. Journal of Science and Technology. 
[Jan. 
reach of storm waves, so that it gradually becomes covered with vegeta¬ 
tion ; and wave-cut cliffs and sea caves also beyond the reach of the waves. 
Such evidence of uplift may be seen at many places along the shore in the 
neighbourhood of Wellington, and best of all along the strip of beach 
extending southward from Breaker Bay, Seatoun, where they have not yet 
been destroyed by the vandal roadmaker (fig. 1). The uplift of these 
beaches, rocky platforms, caves, and cliffs took place in 1855, however, 
and there is a noticeable absence of similar evidence pl.a series of earlier 
movements of the same kind. On the contrary, the height of the cliffs 
and the width of the rocky platform at their base {e.g., at the eastern side 
of Lyall Bay) indicate that for a long period prior to 1855 the relative levels 
of sea and land remained constant.* 
This is a hopeful sign, for from it we may infer either that the move¬ 
ment which took place in 1855 was an isolated phenomenon, or else that 
it inaugurated a new era of rapid, spasmodic uplift. We may hope that 
the former inference is the true one. 
Fig. 1.—A raised beach at Breaker Bay, Seatoun, Wellington. 
On other parts of the shore-line in the immediate vicinity of Wellington 
there is no evidence to indicate that the land has not been stable for a 
very long period as compared with the lives of men. It is only when 
looked at from the point of view of geological history, which accustoms 
one to think in millions of years, that the district can be described as 
showing evidence of great disturbance in comparatively recent times. 
* On the authority of a Maori tradition the writer assumed in 1912 {Trans. N.Z. 
Inst., vol. 44, p. 253) that an uplift of sufficient magnitude to close a tidal channel 
through the sand isthmus connecting Miramar Peninsula to the mainland on the western 
side of Port Nicholson (between the heads of Lyall and Evans Bays) had taken place 
about four hundred years ago, but this assumption, as the writer realized at the time, 
is opposed to the general evidence of the shore-line features. The statement then made 
that “ it seems probable that without a slight movement of elevation a shallow channel 
would always have been kept open through the bar by the tide” was the result of too 
hasty a generalization When there is an alternative outlet to the sea a continuous bar 
may well be built up by littoral drift alone, so as to close a channel completely, and 
there are very numerous examples of such bars. The Maori tradition cited may, of 
course, refer to an earthquake, but it is improbable that the final closing of the channel 
was directly connected with this event, and the occurrence of a movement of uplift at 
that time is not proved by it. 
