264 
ORIGIN OF LIFE IN AMERICA 
subsidences drowned the Antilles to such an extent, accord¬ 
ing to Professor Hill, that only the higher summits of Cuba, 
Haiti and Jamaica remained above sea-level as small islands. 
The West Indian islands were subsequently raised into a large 
continuous and connected land. In late Miocene and Pliocene 
times the gradual and final dismemberment of the Antillean 
lands took place. Still more recently a further elevation 
occurred, not sufficient, however, to establish a united 
Antillean continent. Whether Professor Schuchert* supports 
Professor Hill’s hypothesis of a wide land connection be¬ 
tween Florida and Venezuela in late Jurassic times is not 
clearly indicated in his maps. But during the Cretaceous 
Period all the West Indian islands except the Bahamas are 
represented as being entirely submerged. In Eocene times 
the greater part of Cuba was above sea-level. In the succeed¬ 
ing Oligocene Period all the islands, except the Bahamas, 
once more disappeared. Thenceforth all the Greater Antilles 
retained their present outlines. Only during the Plio¬ 
cene Period was there a land connection between Cuba and 
Yucatan. All these writers thus concur in the view that some 
time during the earlier part of the Tertiary Era there was a 
very profound and widespread subsidence of almost the whole 
of the Antillean area. Yet, according to Professor Schuchert, 
the Bahamas, or some land area in the position of the 
Bahamas, if I correctly interpret his maps, remained above 
sea-level practically from the earliest Palaeozoic ages to the 
present day. The idea that there was once a land connection 
between North and South America along the chain of the 
Lesser Antilles, Cuba, the Bahamas and Florida is also 
advocated by Professor Gregory,f though he admits that 
the area of the Windward islands was submerged at the period 
when the oceanic deposits of Barbados were laid down. There 
is no adequate evidence, he thinks, to show that there was 
more land at any subsequent time in this region than there 
is at present. 
Now as for the light thrown on these various problems 
by a study of the geographical distribution of the West Indian 
* Schuchert, Charles, “ Paleogeography of North America,” Maps S9 — 
100 . 
t Gregory, J. W., “ Geology of the West Indies,” p. 005. 
