268 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 192 8 



South America preseuts in a liiglier degree tliau any otlier part of the world 

 all the features of a homogeneous structure. 



On the other hand, the writer is well aware that recently J. W. 

 Gregory has postulated a north-south trending seaway for Middle 

 Cretaceous (Albian) time — his Angola Gulf (he does not call it a 

 geosyncline) — extending from Tripoli south across the Sahara and 

 so on through western Cameroon^ and thence along the west coast 

 of Africa to Cape Frio. He says ^^ that it 



was not formed till middle Albian times, and the configuration of the Brazilio- 

 Ethiopian continent was essentially the same throughout the upper Albian. 



NEWFOUNDLAND AND IRELAND is 



In many places in Wegener's book we find indirect statements to 

 the effect that Newfoundland was separated from Ireland during 

 Pleistocene time, and direct passages to this effect are found on pages 

 12, 55, 60, 110, 111, 117, and 172. We get the best idea of this 

 connection in the following statement (p. 12) : 



Similarly, North America was close to Europe ; and at least from Newfound- 

 land and Ireland northward, they formed with Greenland one connected block. 



Finally, he states (p. 110) : 



The separation may have taken place at the period of maximum glaciation, 

 or, just as possibly, shortly before. In any case, the distance between the blocks 

 was not of any considerable importance when the glaciation was at its maxi- 

 mum ; on the other hand, the blocks must have been separated considerably by 

 the time of the last glaciation. 



This connection is also illustrated in his map (p. Ill) entitled 

 " Reconstruction of the Continental Blocks for the Great Ice Age." 

 Since, therefore, the separation of Newfoundland from Ireland took 

 place during the Pleistocene, the geology of Newfoundland and 

 Ireland should be alike for all of geological time. Now let us see 

 what are the actual relations, as set down briefly in Table II in oppos- 

 ing columns for easy comparison- 



These facts show unmistakably that Newfoundland was never a 

 part of Ireland, and that each land belongs to a widely differing 

 geological province- Furthermore, the faunas of the two countries 

 are so different that they must ever since Cambrian time have been 

 of distinct faunal provinces, and, judged by those of the present 

 must have been separated from each other by several thousand miles 

 of migration routes- Their faunal similarities and dissimilarities can 



" J. W. Gregory, Supplementary Note on the Geology of Benguella In Relation to Its 

 Cephalopods and the History of the South Atlantic, Trans. Roy. Soc. Edinburgh, vol. 53 

 (1922), pp. 161-163. 



1" For Ireland, see the volume on the British Isles in Handbuch der regionalen Geologic, 

 vol. 3, pt. 1, 1017 ; Stanford's .-Vtlas of Great Britain and Ireland, 1907 ; Jukes-Browne, 

 Building of the British Isles, 1911. 



