My Researches during Six Months' stay in Dusky Sound, commencing on the 10th of April, 1884.

The scenery is beautiful owing to its variety. The sound is about 23 miles long by 2 miles wide. There are several coves which give good shelter to small vessels and boats, also a few easy landings. There are a number of large and small islands, such as the Sentinel and Resolution, which are parted by the Acheron Passage from the mainland, then Long and Cooper's Island, which divide the main channel and the Nine-fathom Passage; there is also a small island in Super Cove not marked on the chart. On the tops of most of these islands there are to be found small lakes and lagoons, but the bush is very dense and the country broken. The mainland ascends from the water in terraces, interrupted by many cliffs and precipices. Near the water is heavy bush, but higher up the vegetation is smaller and denser, and on some places nearer the Alps, it is so thick that I had actually to walk on the top of the scrub, or cut my way through it. The scrub consists mostly of silver pine and hakehake, and there is an extent of grass country well watered, with plenty of rich vegetation. I think it could be used as a sheep-run if the lower land and terraces were cleared to get food and shelter in the severe winter, when the Alps are snowed over. At present they are inhabited by thousands of the wander rats (Mus decumanus), which were a plague to me, and very destructive to the birds. Beyond that are the rugged mountains, where the schist has disappeared and left the colossus of granite behind, some of which are covered with snow. There are many fresh-water streams in the valleys, and, on top of the mountains, lakes and lagoons similar to other New Zealand Alps. Strange to say, on some of them I could only find an outflow, but no inflow. When searching for life, I could find nothing but a few insects. The water is clear and cold. The formation is chiefly granite schist and mica schist, and I have never before noticed such a variety of accessories together in any part of this or the surrounding islands of New Zealand, as in Dusky Sound. Mr. Docherty informed me, and I have myself seen, ruby and peacock ore, yellow sulphide, molibdenite, iron pyrites, amphibole, tremolite, tourmaline, moscovite, chlorite, sphene, titanium, rutile, garnet, orthoclase, asbestos, wolfram, with black and green mica, varieties of quartz and spars and marble.

A better field could not be found for students in practical geology than this. The most of these accessories are found on the top of the Alps where Mr. Docherty has found the seven lodes; they are between two granite dykes, bounded on the west by Mount Huge; from north-east to south-west the granite cut through his lodes; to the east is a chasm which separates Mount Bender from these formations. Four lodes bearing

about from north to south, underlying west, three bearing about east to west underlying north intersecting each other; all these lodes show metal on the surface over 2,000 feet high. There is a valley where these lodes could be got with very little difficulty, also there is plenty of water power for machinery and timber for tramway, and the best anchorage in Dusky Sound is right opposite Mr. Docherty's huts, from whence he has cut a good track to the lodes; also there are two tracks I have cut, No. 1 to the lake I have found and peak above (no name), No. 2 follows eye on the left side of the sound to some succession of waterfalls. This country looks very broken, but any one who is used to alpine travelling could ascend the most of this mountain and also descend on the other side if he looked for the ledges. I would have cut a track to Lake Manapouri, but as the winter was so severe, and I have been alone, I could not venture. In August I measured the ice in one of the lagoons on top of the Alps and it was 6 ½ inches thick, but the lakes on the eastern side of Mount Huge and the one I have found froze in much later. The heaviest frost I experienced in July, when in one night 3 inches of ice formed. Snow was lying from the 15th July to 30th September from 3 feet in depth. There are many snow-drifts and ice-fields, in getting over which I had to gain foothold by cutting steps with a tomahawk. I also experienced heavy snowstorms during the same period, but never without being accompanied by a severe thunderstorm, or vice versa. On the beach the heaviest fall of snow I noticed was 6 inches, in August, but it disappeared in three days. An incessant fall of rain continued during the whole winter in the low lands and of snow on the Alps. From the 10th to end of April there were only eight days without rain, in May only four days, in June thirteen days, in July four days, in August five days, in September ten days.

The following is a list of the species met with, against each of which I have attached the word rare or common, as the case may be:—

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