436 Evolution and Distribution of Fishes 



or birds of passage, or floating rafts have more than a very 

 trivial share in spreading typically inland — not littoral or 

 halogen — plants has, alike from the experimental and the 

 observational standpoints, been proved of small value. 



The publications of the Challenger Expedition, of the 

 German South Seas Expedition, of the Princeton Expedition 

 to Patagonia, and the Transit of Venus Expedition, as well 

 as the more recent and various Antarctic expeditions, have 

 now made us accurately acquainted with the surviving flora 

 of the islands referred to by Hooker, or of the southern 

 part of S. America. We are thus able now to compare both 

 the flora and the fauna of the entire southern region, and in 

 the following pages an outlined sketch is attempted, be- 

 ginning with the plants. 



The arborescent coniferous genera Araiicaria, Liboced- 

 rus, Podocarpus and Dacrydium have representative species 

 from Fuegia to N. Zealand or even Norfolk Islands. Furth- 

 er, species of the first and third are found in Chile, Brazil, 

 and even for Podocarpus in Central America. The grass 

 Deschampsia rari flora extends from Fuegia, the Falkland 

 and St. Georges Islands to Kerguelen, a distance of nearly 

 7000 miles. The peculiar sedge genus Oreobolus includes 

 three closely allied species, that extend from Chile, Fuegia, 

 and the Falkland Islands across to Auckland Islands and 

 Australia. Four species of Astelia have a similar distribu- 

 tion. 



The genus Drimys, one S. American species of which 

 yields Winter's Bark of pharmacal value, is represented 

 by about twelve species that extend from the mountains of 

 Venezuela and Brazil south to Patagonia, thence by Howes 

 Island to N. Zealand, Australia, New Caledonia and even 

 Borneo. The rhamnaceous genus Discaria includes, like 

 Drimys, about twelve species that occur: one in W. Brazil, 

 one in Andean Peru, one in Chile, three in southern Argen- 

 tina, one in Chile-Patagonia, one each in N. Zealand and 

 Australia. 



The single species of Pringlea, once supposed to be 

 eminently peculiar to Kerguelen, has later been found in 

 Heard Islands, the Crozets, and Marion Islands. Now 

 this monotypic genus belongs to a subfamily of the Bras- 



