596 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XV. 



which are the remains of a large sea covering Persia, N. Arabia ami the 

 Kirghiz steppes, Southern Arabia cut off' from the north and probably 

 joined to Somaliland. 



The desert of Gobi is considered to have been open sea in very recent 

 geological times, and the Yellow Sea may have been connected with the 

 Bay of Bengal by a narrow channel through Burmah and the Yangtse 

 Valley — at any rate the Shillong plateau in Assam must have been an 

 island, very near to India on one side and China on the other, and 

 probably periodically connected with one or both. 



To the south it must always have been bounded by the sea though 

 probably larger than it is now ; for a long time being connected with 

 the Maldives and until the end of the cretaceous period if not later with 

 the Lacadives or rather with the now sunken plateaus on which these 

 coral islands rest. 



The diminished area is sufficiently accounted for by a gradual sink- 

 ing after the upheaval of the Himalayas and the constant attraction 

 exerted by them on the tides. 



It is necessary to enforce this point because many people, geologists in 

 particular, have a habit of explaining the presence of the same genus in 

 two widely separated regions by imagining the former existence of a 

 connecting continent. 



One of the favourite continents of this kind is " Lemuria " supposed to 

 have stretched from Madagascar to Sumatra via Ceylon to account for 

 the presence of Lemurs at both ends. When I read of these continents 

 10,000 miles long and 3 miles broad, stretching across bottomless oceans, 

 I always think of a story I once heard of an American. This man had 

 such a fearful habit of exaggerating that he used to spoil the appetites 

 of all other guests at dinner. So one time he agreed with his host before- 

 hand that directly he began to draw the long bow the latter should 

 kick him under the table. 



He behaved all right till desert when the conversation turned on 

 vineries and thence to hot houses generally. Then he began " Ah, but 

 " you should see the hothouses in my country ! In New York City 

 " there's a State conservatory that's 22 miles long and 600 feet high 

 " and — ough — ah " (and then as he stooped to rub his shins) "er — er — 2 

 inches broad ! !" 



Well to my mind it would be as easy to believe the lemurs swam the 

 whole distance as that they should have ambled along a causeway like 



