climax, when, in 1868, Mr. Croll contributed to the Philosophical Magazine his celebrated paper on "Geological Time." Of this theory, and of some of the patent objections to it, Captain Hutton was so good as to give us an account during the discussion on his paper which Mr. Beal opened. A good account of it, given by Dr. Knight in the address before alluded to, is no doubt also familiar to you. As I have said, a reaction has naturally followed upon this and other extravagances of learned men, and evidence that no great change of climate has been universal at one time even in the northern hemisphere has been sedulously collected. One of the latest contributions in support of this view is in a paper on the former climate of the polar regions, which appears in the November number of the Geological Magazine, a perusal of which sent me back again to read with renewed interest Captain Hutton's paper on the New Zealand Fauna. I cannot help avowing the belief that the influence of general speculations about the causes of the northern glacial era, and especially of sundry chapters in that fascinating book, Campbell's "Frost and Fire," have given a warp to the ideas which some of my fellow-members express on the subject of the former glaciation of this island.
On the subject of the most recent remains of the Moa, and whether the birds were or were not contemporaries of former generations of the present native population of New Zealand, I hope we shall yet have a great many more papers. Although, in common with, I think, all my fellow-members of this Society, I believe that the extinction of the latest forms of these strange birds is a thing of very recent date, I am not insensible to the fact, that the evidence we accept as sufficient has not yet brought conviction to the minds of able men elsewhere. In this connection, it is greatly to be regretted that the admission of a paper by Mr. McKay into the "Transactions of the New Zealand Institute" against the protest of Dr. von Haast, has caused that gentleman to withhold from publication the account of his recent researches, and a statement of his latest formed opinions as to the identity or otherwise of the Moa-hunters with the Maori race. An impression prevails that his opinions on the subject have been greatly modified by the results of the exploration of the Sumner Caves, and also by the facts and arguments relied on by the opponents of his theory. I am bound to say, that a recent conversation I enjoyed with Dr. Haast led me to no such conclusion, and I sincerely hope he will reconsider his refusal to contribute further to the "Transactions of the Institute," and let us hear what he has to say about a matter which interests a large section of the public as much as it does his fellow-members of the Institute. All who take an interest in the subject will be glad to hear from him a reply to all that has been advanced against his idea of a palæolithic man who hunted and extirpated the Moa in a remote age. For though we have all our opinions, I think that both here and elsewhere Dr. Haast will find his fellow-members ready to consider with deference whatever he may bring forward. That this is so here, was evidenced during the discussion on Captain Hutton's paper on the "Maori Kitchen Middens at Shag Point," by the unanimous approval which greeted Professor Coughtrey's remark, that the subject on hand was one as to which we "should work and wait, and record our observations without at present drawing what might prove rash conclusions from them." Although Captain Hutton's paper supported the view of the subject which we in Otago have expressed, it is impossible to read it in conjunction with that to which it is virtually a reply, without feeling that Dr. Haast went to the mouth of the Shag River with one theory in his head, and that Captain Hutton and Mr. Booth followed his footsteps with another, and without wondering what would have been seen and concluded by some one who should have gone there without either of these spectacles on his eyes. And this I say without wishing to disparage the work of either