158 BERRY— LOWER EOCENE FLORA OF [April 25, 



The most expeditious refutation of their opinion is furnished by the 

 present distribution of some of the genera, e. g.^ the genus Roiipala 

 has 36 species in tropical America, 2 in New Caledonia and i in 

 Queensland : the genus Embothrium has four Andean species and one 

 in Australia : the genus Lomatia has 3 species in Chile, 4 in Australia 

 and 2 in Tasmania. It follows unless one is prepared to subscribe 

 to the doctrine of special creation for each continent or to the inde- 

 pendent evolution on separate continents of different species of the 

 same genus, that during their geologic history these genera must 

 have ranged over intervening areas, so that if the Cretaceous and 

 Tertiary plants of the northern hemisphere with fruits and leaves of 

 the Proteaceje are not related to the genera that they resemble most, 

 then forms with leaves and fruit resembling those of other families 

 must be fossil Proteaceae, which ought to seem absurd, even to an 

 English botanist. As a matter of fact, while exception may justly 

 be taken to some determinations of Unger, Ettingshausen and Heer, 

 they in no wise affect the main body of facts and there is so much 

 collateral evidence furnished for example by the geologic history of 

 the Araucarian conifers, and the history of the Proteacese is so simi- 

 lar to that of the Myrtacese and Leguminosse — the two other great 

 families of the existing Australian flora, that the evidence seems 

 conclusive. 



Turning now to the fossil record those who follow the opinion 

 of Hooker or Bentham will see how vast and substantial are the 

 supposed illusions of the paleobotanists. In addition to the two ex- 

 tinct genera in the Wilcox flora I have fossil records of 32 genera of 

 Proteacese, although this is artificially enlarged by the joint usage, 

 according to taste, of names like Dryandra and Dryandroides, Bank- 

 sia and Banksites, etc. A brief consideration of these genera with 

 fossil representatives will prove valuable. ^^ 



The genus Protea Linne, from which the family takes its name, 

 has about 60 existing species occupying disconnected areas in Cen- 

 tral and South Africa. To it have been referred a middle Cretace- 

 ous species from Saxony ; 3 Aquitanian species from Prussia, Bo- 

 hemia and Greece ; i species from the Burdigalian of Italy ; i from 



IS This list is not complete but sufficiently so for the purpose of this 

 discussion. 



