EXPLORATIONS IN THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OF MOUNT COOK.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 182, 16 June 1862, Page 6

EXPLORATIONS IN THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OF MOUNT COOK.

11Y JULIUS IIAAST, KSQ., GOVURJiMEUT GEOLOGIST.

In the lyitellon Times of the 20th of March extracts from a private letter by J. Haast, Esq., were published, giving an account of his explorations among the main feeders of Lake Tekapo. The following letter gives a further account of his journey.

Head of Lake Ohou, May 8, 1562,

Having reached the end of Lake Tekapo, I crossed the river issuing from it, and followed the shores of the Lake for six miles, where another river falls into it from the north-cast. I explored this river (which I called the Cass, after our excellent Chief Surveyor) to its sources, coming from two glaciers. As near one of them alow saddle appeared, I ascended, thinking that it might possibly lead to the West Coast; but I found that it brought ns only to the head of one of the glaciers, which belong to the Godley river system. Ascending the high mountain at .the eastern side of this pass, I got a glimpse of the West Coast over the Godley pass. The view was extremely grand; snow-clad peak appearing above snow-clad peak, and glaciers and snow fields being all around us ; my former conviction that there was no easy pass through the central chain was once more strongly confirmed. Having finished the survey of this beautiful valley, I wended my way round the chains between Lake Tekapo and Lake Pukaki towards the river which forms this latter lake. This valley is about two or three miles broad, and lies much lower than the Godley, the river meandering through it in innumerable branches. Here we got-the first fair sight of Mount Cook, and I must confess it quite delighted me. This giant is more conspicuous than its neighbors because it rises abruptly from the broad valley, and towards the west is only separated by a low neve saddle from the central chain. Its outlines are very bold and majestic; nothing in fact can he compared to the'sublimity of the scenery, the sharp contours of tlio glittering snow-clad mountain standing out boldly against the deep azure sky. Although the river is, as I said before, divided into many branches, the crossing of it gave us some trouble, owing to its rapid flow and the great quantity of water, which may be compared with the Ilakaia on the plains. Rounding a point, we came in sight of the main glacier, which terminates about ten miles south of the highest northern peak of Mount Cook, striking quite across the broad valley It is the largest in the Alps, having, even at its terminal face, a breadth of one mile and three quarters. Here we camped, and I occupied myself during several days in studying the geological features of the bold mountain chains around me. I travelled also for several ' miles over the glacier, which I called, in memory of the discoverer of New. Zealand, the Great Tasman Glacier, arid the river issuing from it the Tasman River. Here the same phenomenon as at the God^' glacier appears, another glacier of large dimensions coming from an adjacent valley four miles above the terminal face of the Tasman glacier, but without reaching it, the glacial stream issuing from it flowing along the eastern side of the Great Tasman glacier. The terminal face of the latter lies only about 2700 feet above the sea lev^l. (I could not calculate my altitude exactly, not being in possession of the corresponding barometrical observations taken in Christchurch during my absence.) I shall not entertain you with the difficulties which I experienced in travelling over this enormous glacier, and it is impossible to describe in words the wild scenery with which I was surrounded; the huge mountain chain, in which the towering peaks were of the most fantastic shapes and forms; the tributary glacier, broken in many thousand seracs on their steep sides, and the great glacier itself, covered with an enormous load of debris, crevassed and rent in all directions. Nothing in the European Alps can equal the scenery in magnificence. But, as each beautiful picture has its reverse, so had this: a spell of bad weather kept us for about eight days confined to the tent. North-westers and south-westers alternately sweeping through the valley, bringing rain and snow in abundance, enveloped us in clouds and mists, and only now and then one of the snowy giants appeared dimly, half-cloud and half-ghost, through the mist around us. Our provisions began to run short, but, as I had a gun with me, our larder, when the weather cleared up for a moment, was filled with paradise ducks, green alpine parrots, and kakas, the two latter abounding on the wooded sides of Mt. Cook, near our camp. But do not think me such a barbarian as to have eaten such rare specimens of natural history as the large green alpine parrot without skinning them first. Woodhens and rats were also plentiful, but we despised them, having plenty of better game. At last the weather clearer! rp\ nivl the 12th of April, at daylijhr. we staned to asetud Mt. Cook. It was a cold but sunny morning; and, with great expectations, we climbed through the Fagus forest, which, for the first six or seven hundred feet, intermixed with alpine shrubs, covers the sides of the range. After leaving the forest, we came to alpine vegetation, about 1800 feet above the valley amongst the rocks, where we climbed along to the crest of the mountain leading towards Mt. Cook.

But althougli the ridge, a3 seen from the valley, seemed quite smooth, it consisted of huge rocks, broken up into very sharp prismatic fragments, lying loosely upon each other, often with deep precipices on both sides, where one false step would have cost life or limb. Soon, patches of snow appeared, ■which were remaining from the last storms, over which we worked our way higher and higher. The view at every moment became grander; and having reached an altitude of 6500 feet, I established my first station. Although the sun shone brilliantly from a cloudless sky, it was extremely chilly in the shade amongst the rocks, where we went to shelter us from the icy blowing winds. The thermometer at 11 o'clock stood below freezing point. Again, on our road the rocks became still more and more broken : hitherto they had consisted of sandstones, but now slates made their appearance, and about 7500 above the sea we came upon a precipice of about 10 feet wide, and perhaps 30 feet deep— the vertical stratum of clay slates having been here decomposed: as it was impossible to round it, and we had not a ladder with us to throw across, we were obliged to retreat. The view from this point is admirable in the extreme. The bold forms of Mount Cook proper occupied the foreground, surrounded by many peaks of every different shape. Deep below us the great Tasmau glacier carried slowly but steadily its heavy detritus loads down to its terminal faces; whilst, towards the south, the large watershed of Lake Pukaki, surrounded by well-shaped hills, appeared in the horizon. As I observed before, west of Mt. Cook a low snow saddle (about .8000 feet) leads to the West Coast, and then the central chain again assumes its natural grandeur. I did myself the pleasure to name it the'Moorhpuse llange, after our Superintendent, and called its highest summit Mt. Sefton. Here two glaciers came, down, one from the south, the other from the north, uniting their outlets with the Tasman river. A great deal of new snow had been collected

fully before us, and we enjoyed the fine spectacle of witnessing during our ascent five avalanches fall from' Mt. Sefton, the thunder occasioned by them being reverberated by the echoes in the mountains around us. Oh! that I were a poet, to sing the beauty of the southern Alps: the time will surely come when pilgrims from all parts of the southern hemisphere will hasten to visit these mountains, and then the good folks of Canterbury will be inundated with poetical effusions, and "My rambles in the Southern Alps," or, "Impressions of a Journey to Mount Cook,' 1 with splendid engravings, will be on the drawingroom tables of future generations.

Descending by the right bank of the Tasman, I very soon found that the bad reputation this river has, is not altogether without foundation. For about eight miles from its mouth, quicksands and swamps follow each other in unpleasant succession, and, as the bounding hills were too steep and too scrubby for the horses, we had to work our way through this labrynth. It cost us two daj's before we had worked through, besides nearly losing two of my horses and getting various duckings ; we camped at last at the margin of Lake Pukaki. We were awakened in the morning by the bleating of sheep, which I welcomed as a sign of approaching civilization: one of my more prosaic companions as that of—fresh mutton.

The view from the outlet of Lake Pukaki towards the Southern Alps, with Mt. Cook in the centre and the wooded islet in the foreground, is sublime in the extreme, and when we imagine numerous villas and parks around its shores, the Lago di Como or Lago Maggiore would not bear comparison with it. No auriferous rocks are met with here, but the same sandstones and slates in huge foldings forming the eastern side of the Alps. But I may here mention that the shores of the three lakes which I visited are formed by the remnants of huge glaciers, which iv (geologically speaking) recent times, descended so far towards the sea. I followed the old latera moraine of Tasman to the end of Lake Pukaki, where it appears as a terminal moraine. These moraines rest upon drift formation, proving thus that they are of recent formation. What enormous changes must have taken place in the southern hemisphere, in comparatively recent periods! When I see before me these clear signs of those changes, I can easily imagine what a splendid sight a glacier of such dimensions, about 40 miles long and 5 miles broad, would have presented to human beings, had they existed in those days.

That these moraines lie on drift formation explains many features of the Alps which in the Eangitata rather puzzled me. Conceive New Zealand so far submerged that only the principal mountain ranges appear above the sea, covered with perpetual snow and glaciers, reaching into the ocean. The terminal faces of the latter, as they advanced into the water, were continually washed away or broken off, and, as huge icebergs, carried away by the tides and currents, scattering their heavy detritus loads as they melted down or stranded on the shallower places over the bottom of the ocean, just as we now witness in the dreary regions of the polar zones. The country rose again ; the climate in consequence got warmer, and the glaciers no longer reached the sea. Now, these moraines which surround the lakes of the Mount Cook country' show exactly the spot where the terminal face of the glaciers rested first upon the dryland, and then, melting away in the usual manner, formed terminal moraines. 'I should not have entered into these details did I not know that it intez-ested you ; but I shall explain this much more fully in my future report, when I shall treat about all those phenomena, which are able to throw light not only on the physical geography of New Zealand, but also of" that of the whole southern hemisphere.

My journey to Lake Ohou was without incident ; and although this lake is not so large as its two neighbors, it can ,boast at least of beautiful clear water, the two others being always rendered opaque by finely-suspended matter. Here and there bush appears, which renders its shores more picturesque than those of the two others, which are entirely devoid of timber. I ascended the two rivers which form this lake, both of which come from the Moorhouse range, the "principal one from the south-eastern slope of Mount Sefton. Although much smaller in size than the glacier before alluded to, the principal gracier is very beautiful, not being soiled by detritus. It brought vividly before my mind the Rosenlaus glacier. The mountains on both sides of these two valleys are densely covered with Fagus forest (black birch) above which Alpine vegetion appears, which gives way in turn to magnificent rocks, from which small but pretty falls rush down. The contrast of the colors of the dark green vegetation and the silvery bands being of especial beauty. Here also we met with very bad weather, which detained me much longer than I anticipated, so. that our provisions began to fail, and as a few farewell snow-storms began to throw a white garment over the whole country, and. I could not wait, we finished the surveys during them. The weather was kind enough to give us such a view of the Southern Alps that I know now how [they look in winter, although I must confess it was often very wet and cold work. The south-west winds were followed by northwesters and heavy rains, but we managed to come down the'swollen river to the headofthe lake, lightened both of provisions and gunpowder, the last charge being expended on some paradise ducks, which gave us a welcome meal. During the time lam writing, these gales are blowing with a vehemence of which (notwithstanding it blows sometimes pretty hard in Christchurch) you can form no idea; but as soon as it clears up, I shall begin to retrace my steps towards the metropolis. Let me add that the two last winters must have been of an unusually severe character, seeing the great amount of damage done by the avalanches. There are whole mountain sides entirely laid bare, the entire forest being uprooted or broken, as if the large trees were as many feeble reeds.

On the whole it has been a very interesting journey, although we had occasionally hard times of it. I was very glad to have such a well-selected party with me. Not one of my men ever grumbled, and every one of them bore the fatigues and privations, the wet and cold in such a way that I cannot praise them enough for it. My letter is rather long, but as I know that you like to hear of my doings, I cannot make better use of the rainy weather than to write to you. My herbarium is well filled, although there is a great sameness in the vegetation ; notwithstanding, I collected not a few interesting and undeseribed plants.

I shall relate to you verbally about the quadrupeds in the rivers forming Lake Ohou, the large Kiwi and other remarkable birds. The night closes in, and a slush lamp is not such a pleasant light as to tempt me to proceed.— Lyttelton Times.

Dodging thk Poiicb.—The Lac Man Miner has the following:—Sir F. Pottenger slipped away the other evening in disguise, taking with him sundry aboriginals, who could "smell the colour of the hair of any man/and a fair dose of mounted troopers noted for their bravery. As they left Forbes in the distance, the very man f hey had gone out to huut down passed them, took their measure, and sauntered into the town, of Forbes to enjoy himself, patronizing the Standard and Exhibition, taking his quiet liquor and studying "ye manners and ye customs of ye

TELLING TRUTH TO AN EMPEROR

Prince Dolgoroukow, 'a Russian nobleman, resident for some years in Paris, published a short time ago a curious and instructive work on llussia, entitled La Verite sur la Russia, and which, as you may suppose, was anything but agreeable. to the Russian Government. The Prince was at once summoned to return to Russia, and on his refusal—having quitted it of his own accord—was declared by the Senate of Moscow, approved by the Council of the Empire, to have forfeited his rights of a Russian citizen and his title as a Russian prince, and was moreover condemned to perpetual banishment from the empire. The ordinance was confirmed by the Emperor Alexander in July last; but it was never officially communicated to the Prince, who learned his condemnation only on the sth of the present month from the Russian newspapers. Prince Dolgoroukow has addressed a letter to the Czar, from which the following are extracts: — " The ordinance declares me tq be deprived of the civic rights of a Russian noble. Sire, I have enumerated in my book The Truth about Russia, those alleged rights of a Russian noble, and I can appreciate the value of them. ' Your Majesty will admit that the only one of these privileges of 'the Russian nobility which the Government has not trampled under foot since the period, now a century ago, when these privileges were given, is that of not being scourged in public, as the rural classes are, but of being scourged privately in the offices of the political police. You will not feel astonished, Sire, at learning that I have no intention of returning to Russia to claim that noble privilege. The ordinance condemns me to the forfeiture of the title of Prince. Sire, in our days a title to which the exercise of political power is not attached is worthless ; and to the vain title of Prince I attach no value. But your Majesty has not the right to deprive me of it, for my ancestors did not receive' it from yours. My ancestors bore it by reason of the real sovereignty they exercised, just as you exercise your sovereignty at this moment. My. ancestors, as you well know, Sire, were Grand Dukes, and governed Russia at a time when your Majesty's ancestors were not even called simple Counts of Oldenburg." The ordinance having declared that the recall of the Prince was " in consequence of unpleasant information received about his conduct in foreign countries," the Prince declares that this ia "a falsehood," and unworthy of an}' one, and much more of a great Government;" and that he had been on the best terms with the Russian Ambassador in Paris up to the moment he published his book on Russia. That publication, he adds, is the only crime he has committed; it is a criirie which he has resolved to commit again, and for which he is far from feeling any compunction. Tlie following are the closing passages of the Prince's letter :—

" Sire, —See in what a condition despositism has placed Russia. You are well disposed, and you cannot prevent your functionaries and your courtiers from committing the most odious acts. You are an houest mau, and you cannot protect your subjects against pillage. You are frank and loyal, and yet the liberty of conscience is trampled under foot. You reign over the vastest empire in Europe, and your Treasury is empty. You rule 75,000,000 of subjects, and you cannot go to war, because you have no money and no regular administration. You have the title of Autocrat, and you cannot enforce the execution of your orders; you cannot uproot abuses. Landed proprietors are ruined, merchants are ruined, the peasants are oppressed and discontented, and suffering and discontent are general throughout Russia. Sire, this state of things cannot last. It is leading Russia to revolution. It is leading you on to catastrophes, and it is leading your dynasty to its fall and to exile. It depends on you, Sire, to save yourself and to save us from these dangers. Proclaim the abolition of corporal punishment. Proclaim equality before the law, freedom of conscience; person al liberty, and the abolition of confiscation and sequestrations'. Call together the representatives of the natives in a House of Commons (Douma Sernskuia). Introduce into Russia the repi'esentative system. Establish, in accord with the representatives of the country, a moderate Constitution. Give freedom to the press, without which all other lreedom is a delusion, and you will be, Sire, the benefactor of Russia. What can you lose by doing so ? The title of Autocrat. But this title gives you no real power; it only exposes you to be forever disobeyed, deceived, and robbed. By promulgating the Constitution you will have the blessings and affections of your subjects. History will place you in the rank of the greatest sovereigns ; and you will have consolidated your dynasty on the Throne of all the Russias."