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Cave near Mount Nicholas.
This cave is situated on the south side of Lake Wakatipu, two miles east of the Von River, in a small conical hill about a quarter-of-a-mile from the Lake. There is a tolerably steep rise, covered with long fern, to the entrance of the cave, which is in the overhanging face of a mica schist rock.
The entrance is about sixteen feet high, and ten feet broad, from which it narrows, both in height and width, to five feet. The top meeting the
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bottom at the end of the cave. The estimated length of the cave is forty feet.
The floor consisted of a fine powdered rock, which was encrusted to a depth of two inches with rectangular crystals of a clear salt * resembling saltpetre. Some of this, or a similar substance, was found in pieces two inches long by one deep. The depth of the sand was nine inches.
Below this was a coarser formation of small flakes of schist, which extended to a depth of two feet six inches. The next stratum was composed of still coarser material, with broken blacks of schist through it. The depth of this was not tried.
The only trace of water was a slight drip on the left side near the entrance. In places the roof was encrusted with a thin covering of a white substance † which, probably, damp had caused to exude from the rock. ‡
No traces of animal life were found lower than about six inches from the surface, except at the entrance end, where the material appeared to consist of animal and vegetable matter, which had drifted down from the other parts of the floor, which had a steep incline from the entrance inwards.
Thirty feet from the entrance, in the two-inch crust, a small quantity of double-shafted feathers, of a greyish-brown colour, and three inches long, were obtained. They were scattered separately through the sand. The height of the cave at this place was about three and a-half feet, and the width six feet.
Further in was a small collection of short sticks, fern, and broom, which might be the remains of a nest. Here the feathers were scarcer, and a metatarsus was found in good preservation which measured 8 inches in length, 6 ⅞ girth at proximal end, 3 ⅞ at thinnest part, and 8 ¾ girth at distal end; § also portions of egg-shell of a green colour, which appeared to be parts of a large egg, probably that of a large duck.
In both of these places feathers of different birds were found, the greater number belonging to the Paroquet (Platycercus). These appeared to be generally nearer to the surface than those first mentioned.
Close to the end of the cave were found a fibula, measuring 11 1/3 in length, and 4 7/3 girth at the proximal end, and several vertebræ, and a portion of an upper mandible. All of these belonged most likely to the same bird.
[Footnote] * Sulphate of soda, or Glauber's salt.—J. G. B.
[Footnote] † Gypsum.—J. G. B.
[Footnote] ‡ Gypsum.—J. G. B.
[Footnote] § D. casuarinus.—F. W. H.
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There were also bones of other kinds of birds, some of which were very delicate, together with a considerable number of pieces of egg-shell. These were white, and might belong to a duck, but no feathers of this bird were found.
Excrement of a large bird was also found, which extended to a greater depth than the feathers. Some of this consisted of undigested fragments of what looked like the stalk of the fern.