422 ORIGIN OF LIFE IN AMERICA 



America to the broken columns found by Oriental travellers 

 in the ruined and deserted cities of a vanished civilisation. 

 And as an archaeologist may restore from such, fragments the 

 fallen temples or disused aqueducts, so may a naturalist trace 

 the missing arches of life that once spanned the gap." Mr. 

 Hedley * favours the theory of a direct land connection in 

 Mesozoic or early Tertiary times between Tasmania and 

 Tierra del Fuego across the South Pole, while New Zealand 

 then reached sufficiently near this antarctic land without join- 

 ing it, to receive by flight or drift many animals and plants. 

 He thinks the faint affinity of Antarctica to Africa would be 

 explicable on the supposition that before either America or 

 Australia had united with the former, Africa had already 

 broken away from it. 



A very memorable discussion on this question took place 

 during the fourteenth annual meeting of the American 

 Society of Naturalists in Philadelphia. Reviewing the geo- 

 logy of the antarctic regions, Professor Heilprin f stated that 

 in its relation to the other continents there was reason to 

 believe that Antarctica, whether as a continent or in frag- 

 mental parts, had a definite connection with one or more of the 

 land -masses lying to the north, and that the suspicion could 

 hardly be avoided that such connection was, if with' nothing 

 else, with New Zealand (and through it with Australia) and 

 Patagonia. The facts of palaeontology are best explained, 

 according to Professor Scott $ on the assumption that the 

 antarctic land -mass has at one time or another been connected 

 with Africa, Australia and South America, all of which once 

 radiated from the South Pole, just as North America and 

 Eurasia now do from the North Polar area. 



Although Professor Britton cited many examples of 

 astonishingly close relationship between plants of Australia, 

 southern South America and South Africa, it is unnecessary 

 in his opinion to invoke as an explanation a former land con- 

 nection across the antarctic region. 



Arguing from the geographical distribution of the fishes, 



* Hedley, 0., " Surviving Refugees in Austral Lands," pp. 3 6. 

 t Heilprin, A., " Geology of Antarctic Regions," pp.306 307. 

 t Scott, W. B., " Antarctica Palaeontology," p. 310. 

 Britton, N. L., "Origin of Antarctic Flora," p. 311. 



