14 Art. 5. — Matajiro Yokoyama: 



(Bureja), Sakhalin (51° N.L.), Kamtchatka. Alaska, etc., forming 

 so to say a wreath around the present North Pole, but far nearer 

 to it on the Atlantic side than on the Pacific. Neumayr wislied 

 to bring the pole ten degrees nearer to the Asiatic side on the 

 meridian of Ferro, while Nathorst increased the displacement to 

 twenty degrees on the meridian of 120° E. long., which would 

 bring the position of the supposed North Pole in the lower region 

 of the Olenek just west of the Lower Lena. Nathorst also sought 

 to account for the smallness of the leaves of the fossil plants found 

 at Lena by the proximity of the pole and the temperate character 

 of our Miocene plants, whicli according to him contain not a single 

 element whicli points to a climate warmer than the present. But 

 Neumayr in the second edition of his Erdgeschichte'^ seems to be 

 inclined to renounce his former assumption, because of the dis- 

 covery of ordinary Arctic-Tertiary plants in one of the New 

 Siberian Islands which are not far off from the supposed North 

 Pole of Nathorst. 



Now, if I may be allowed to express my own opinion on the 

 above subject, I would say that it is not at all necessary to fix the 

 position of the pole so as to make it as equidistant as possible from 

 the various fossil localities. It may as Avell be taken as lying 

 more to the east, nearer to a meridian passing through the Bering 

 Strait. In saying this, however, I am by no means trying to 

 establish the position of the Miocene pole. On the contrary, I 

 think it is very difficult to locate this, because the distribution of 

 land and water was then very different from what it is to-day. 

 Furthermore, other factors which determined the geographical 

 distribution of plants at that time are utterly unknown to us. 

 Therefore I simply say that the North Pole may have been then 

 in a different position from now, but that the data, now at our 

 disposal, are too scanty to justfy us even in guessing at it. 



The case becomes different in the succeeding ages. Here the 

 climatic contrasts in the East and the West are very strong, and 

 always in such a w^ay that when it is cold on one side it is warm 



1) Vol. II, p. 385, 1895. 



