4 TRANS. ST, LOUIS ACAD. SCIENCE. 



that of the present tune of the middle States of North America," 

 where Magnolias still survive. It seems highly probable, even 

 if there be as yet no certain evidence of the fact, that there con- 

 tinued to be land above water in that North Atlantic region until 

 times within the human period. Some geologists have deemed it 

 quite probable, and Mr. Croll* has given some proofs, that Green- 

 land was connected with Northern Europe as recently as the 

 glacial epoch. The stone implements discovered by Dr. C. C. 

 Abbot in the river gravels of the Delaware (according to Prof 

 Shaler) "prove the existence of interglacial man on this part of 

 our shore." 



But geology demonstratt- s that the continents have been dis- 

 titicth marked out and separated in the main (though not entirely) 

 by deep una wide seas from the earliest periods. The recent 

 soundings render it probable, if not certain, that there has always 

 been a deep sea between Madagascar and Australia in the direct 

 line across. This would seem to preclude the conjecture of some 

 writers (and more recently ot Haeckclf and PeschelJ) in the man- 

 ner as stated by them, that a continental "Lemuria" once existed 

 there, which is now sunk beneath the Indian Ocean. There is 

 perliaps no longer any need of so large an assumption, since the 

 land extensions, suggested by Mr. Wallace, appear to be sufficient 

 to explain all the known facts, and are far more certain in a geo- 

 logical point of view. 



Upon this general survey, taking into view the configurations 

 of continents and oceans and the continuity of land areas, in the 

 Miocene and later times, in reference to the geological and geo- 

 graphical distribution of the Mammalia, the first great facts that 

 strike the mind are these : That, as far back as the Eocene, 

 Lemurs existed within the Palaarctic province above defined, 

 and extended southwardly into Madagascar on the west and into 

 Celebes on the east, where they still survive in some species, 

 having been sufficiently protected from entire extinction in those 

 remote situations ; that in the Miocene the Simiadas also existed 

 within that same Palasarctic area, where they for the most part 

 have become extinct (as the Lemurs also have entirely), in later 



* Climate and Time in Geological Relations. By James Croll. New York, iSTS- 

 t History of Creation. Trans, by E. Ray Lancaster. New York 1876. 

 X The Races of Man and their Geographical Distribution. By Oscar Peschel. New 

 York, 1S76. 



