146 Chapman, The Palcpozoic Flora. [vo["xxxiv 



indicative of fresh-water or local lacustrine influence only, and 

 do not yield any coal accumulations so far as these rocks reveal 

 at their outcrops. 



Whilst the coal flora of Europe and North America belongs 

 largely to the period of the Lepidodendron, that of the southern 

 hemispliere comes later, in the great development of Ganga- 

 mopteris and Glossopteris. In regard to the term Permo- 

 Carboniferous — or more correctly Carbo-Permian — there is 

 strong reason for regarding these beds as true Permian.* They 

 are contemporaneous witli the Lower (iondwana of India and 

 the Karoo of South Africa. In Victoria the Carbo-Pcrmian 

 beds consist of glacial conglomerates, corresponding to the 

 Talchir series of India and the Dwyka Conglomerate of South 

 Africa, which pass up into Gangcwwplerts-hcaving sandstones. 

 The fern known as Gangamopteris is common to Russia, India, 

 Australia, South Africa, Brazil, and Argentina, and is generally 

 more abundant in the lower part of the G/o,s.so;^/m5-bearing 

 rocks. Gangamopteris chiefly differs from Glossopteris in the 

 absence of a definite midrib and in having the median anasto- 

 mosing veins almost parallel. In some forms the fronds are 

 much more broadly ovate or rounded than in Glossopteris, the 

 latter being more unifonnly tongue-shaped. 



Whilst the Australian Carboniferous flora shows marked 

 affinities towards that of Europe in containing Lepidodendron 

 and Rhacopteris, the Glossopteris flora belongs to a special 

 development of vegetation evolved in a separate area mapped 

 out as Gondwanaland, extending from China through India, 

 Australia, South Africa, South America, and the Antarctic. 

 There are several more or less well defined species of the genus 

 Glossopteris, and their abundance and variety merit the special 

 importance given to this period of vegetative development. 

 The Glossopteris flora is found in all the Australian States (in 

 Victoria represented by Gangamopteris), but only in New South 

 Wales and Queensland have coal measures been extensively 

 formed. In New South Wales the quantity of coal is roughly 

 estimated at 100,000,000,000 tons, and that of Queensland is 

 not far short. The coal series of Tasmania and Western 

 Australia are insignificant, being represented by small seams 

 and poor quaHty coal. The fossil plant remains, long known 

 as Vcrtehraria, have been shown to belong to the rhizomes of 

 the Glossopteris ferns. Ncvggerathiopsis, found in New South 

 Wales and Tasmania, shows some aflinities with the Cordaitales, 

 which view is held by Zeiller, Seward, and Solms-Laubach ; 

 it may therefore be an interesting survival from Devonian 

 times in Australia of a component of the European flora. The 



* See David, " Federal Handbook Brit. Assoc," 1914, p. 267. 



