C. —6.

APPENDIX P. REPORT OF THE SCENERY PRESERVATION BOARD. The Scenery Preservation Board comprises the following members : The Surveyor-General (Chairman) ; the General Manager, Department of Tourist and Health Resorts ; the Under-Secretary, Native Department; and the Commissioner of Crown Lands for the district within which the lands being dealt with are situated. Meetings were held in the office of the Surveyor-General, Wellington, on the 13th June, 1929 (North Auckland, Auckland, Taranaki, Marlborough, Nelson and Westland) ; Ist August, 1929 (North Auckland, Nelson, and Westland) ; 10th October, 1929 (North Auckland, Auckland, Taranaki, and Wellington) ; 11th December, 1929 (Nelson, Marlborough, Westland, Canterbury, and Otago) ; and 7th January, 1930 (Auckland). Twenty-nine recommendations were submitted by the Board to His Excellency the GovernorGeneral for the acquisition and reservation of areas of scenic and historic interest throughout the Dominion under the provisions of the Scenery Preservation Act. The death occurred during the year of Mr. B. M. Wilson, General Manager of the Department of Tourist and Health Resorts. Mr. Wilson had been a member of the Board for many years, and had always taken a very keen interest in its work. At a meeting held 011 the 10th October, 1929, the members placed on record their appreciation of the valuable services rendered by Mr. Wilson, and their deep sense of the great loss sustained by his death. 11. E. Walshe, Chairman.

APPENDIX G. THE GLACIAL ,SCENIC RESERVES OE WESTLAN I). By Dr. L. Cookayjsie, C.M.G., F.R.S., and Dr. E. Teichelmann, Member of the English Alpine Club. General. The definite stamp impressed on any piece of natural scenery is made by its plant-covering and not by its geomorphological structure. The latter may be the same the world over —sand-dunes, alluvial plains, rolling hills, and high mountains, to cite common examples ; but the physiognomy and likewise the geographical position of a landscape, undisturbed by man, may be at once indicated by its vegetation, and, above all, by its forest-covering, should it be so adorned. Nowhere is this better illustrated than in that part of New Zealand dealt with here, for, though glaciers are a familiar feature of many lands and though, in some places, they descend to the lowlands, yet in 110 other part of the earth at the same latitude can such rivers of ice be seen flowing through forest-clad defiles far into the lowland belt (fig. 1) —the terminal faces of Franz Joseph and Fox, respectively 692 ft. and 670 ft.—while the forests themselves bear 110 resemblance to those of temperate lands in general, but rather are they first cousins to those of the moist tropics. In short, the scenery dealt with here, in terms of its vegetation, and its species of plants, may with all propriety be described as " unique." Even in New Zealand itself —a land of scenic surprises—there is nothing which matches in character the scenery of the area pierced by the Franz Joseph and Fox Glaciers —iong rivers of ice issuing from vast snowfields and passing finally through an evergreen forest where the dominant tree is of tropical origin, where tree-ferns grow at 110 great distance from the ice (fig. 2), and where an early colonist on rock recently left bare by the retreating ice is an epiphytic orchid ! Here, leaving the description of the scenery, as scenery, to abler pens than ours, we attempt only to briefly tell something more prosaic about the all-important vegetation of the Glacial Reserves of Westland and the species of which it is composed, and to deal with some other matters which may interest those visitors to South Westland, and others, who may read this paper. The reserves themselves, four in number, embrace the glaciers and snowfields on the western side of the main Divide of the Southern Alps from which issue the Callery, Waiho, Fox, and Gook Rivers, together with the country in the vicinity of these torrential streams —mostly forest-clad (lig. 1) —such extending for some distance westwards of the Main South Road and ascending, where bare of snow in summer, to an altitude of 5,000 ft., or even higher (see map). The total length of the whole block of country is approximately thirty miles, its average width about nine miles and a half, and its approximate area about 293 square miles ; but these figures give 110 idea of its rugged nature or of the difficulties its explorers have to surmount. Botanically most of the area is unexplored, so our statistics, &c., cannot be considered final, especially in what concerns the high-mountain vegetation and species. Nevertheless, as a good deal is already known concerning the plant-life of Westland in general, and as such seems to be fairly uniform throughout, our account of the vegetation and flora of the reserves should be, in the main, accurate, and the gaps to be filled not very wide.

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