1899] ORIGIN OF AUSTRALIAN FLORA 209 
deference, that a fact such as the survival of Lingula through countless 
ages, while multitudes of closely related and equally effective forms 
have long been extinct, is not devoid of the element of mystery. Such 
a consideration as that adduced by Professor Drude seems wholly 
insufficient to outweigh the life-labours of men like Unger and 
Goeppert, Heer, Ettingshausen, and others. True, their determina- 
tions may sometimes be open to objection; but in such a case as this 
there seems no alternative but to accept, as correct in the main, the 
conclusions unanimously recorded by specialists in this branch of the 
science. When, therefore, one finds in the Australian tertiary flora 
such characteristically northern genera as Myrica, Betula, Alnus, 
Quercus, Salix, Fagus, Laurus, Magnolia, all of which, with the exception 
of Fagus, now scantily represented on the south-eastern highlands, 
and possibly of Quercus as mentioned above, have vanished like the 
fantasies of a dream, one cannot repress a feeling of wonder that such a 
phrase as “the Scandinavian privilege of ubiquity” should ever have 
been called into use. Most of the above genera, if present distribution 
is to be relied on, and present distribution is the main support of the 
northern predominance theory, have had their origin in the most 
extensive land area of the globe, where, according to Mr. Darwin, com- 
petition has been most severe and long-continued, and moreover they 
are still important elements in the northern flora. On the current 
hypothesis these favoured forms should have entirely or partially 
eliminated their competitors, instead of which they have themselves 
gone to the wall. But besides this we are not entitled to assume that 
Australia was inhabited in earlier tertiary times by no other “ northern ” 
genera than have already been found in tertiary deposits there. It is 
also inconceivable that herbaceous vegetation did not then exist side by 
side with the shrubs and trees whose harder parts have ensured their 
preservation in the fossil condition. But before we are in a position 
to state what this herbaceous vegetation really was, Australian tertiary 
deposits must be examined in the way in which Mr. Clement Reid is 
now examining our tertiary beds with such interesting results, for the 
ordinary organs of herbs are of too fragile and evanescent a nature to 
allow of their preservation, and recourse must be had to the evidence 
yielded by fruits, and especially by seeds, involving a tedious opera- 
tion indeed, but one which must be undertaken before we can feel 
ourselves on safe ground. Meanwhile we cannot close our eyes to the 
possibility that a fair number of herbaceous species belonging to 
“northern” genera may have become extinct in Australia since the 
time when the “ primitive tertiary flora” flourished there. 
And while we recognise how favourable to the northern flora are 
the geographical and climatal conditions of Northern Europe at the 
present time, it should not be forgotten that such was not always the 
case. In Miocene times, for instance, when Greenland enjoyed a 
climate similar to that of Southern Europe to-day, where was the 
14—wnar. sc.—vo.. xy. no. 91. 
