[MATTHEW | CLIMATIC ZONES IN DEVONIAN TIME 135 
Thus it will be seen that the plants of the Assise of Evieux are 
clearly within the types recognized as Devonian, but they are quite 
near the top of this System. The Upper Devonian of Belgium is con- 
sidered to have three stages—Givetian, Frasnien and Famennian— 
It is one of the upper assises of the upper stage of the three that contain 
the plant remains. There is one higher assise, Comblain au Pont, which 
contains a Phacops and to this succeeds the T'ournasian stage of the 
Lower Carboniferous. At the base of this stage is the Hastiére assise 
consisting of limestone and shales holding Spirifer glaber of large size 
and an abundance of S. tornacensis, there is also a Phillipsia. Above 
the Tournasian stage in Belgium comes the Viséan with Productus cora 
and other well known species of that genus. This is exactly the re- 
lation which we find in the Lower Carboniferous limestones of the Valley 
of the Avon in Nova Scotia, where the lower limestones, contain Spirifer 
glaber and a Phillipsia. It will be seen when we come to deal with the 
southern range of Upper Devonian terranes in the maritime provinces 
of Canada that the plant beds of Horton ete., come beneath these lime- 
stones, and therefore according to the Belgian geologists would be 
Devonian. 
The Upper Devonian of Bear Island. 
From the north of Great Britain and the islands that fringe its 
northern shore, where Upper Devonian rocks are to be found, it is a 
comparatively short distance to Bear Island in the Arctic sea. This 
island lies about half way between the North Cape of Norway and 
Spitzbergen, farther out in the same sea. Oswald Heer first described 
the remarkable Paloæzoic flora of this little island of the Polar ocean, 
and considered that the plants indicated a Lower Carboniferous Age. 
But its flora has been greatly enriched in genera and species by 
Professor A. G. Nathorst of Stockholm. This author has published 
a memoir on these plants full of rich details of the character of the 
flora, the method of occurrence of the plants, and their relation to 
Devonian species in other lands, already described. In his preface he 
shows the attitude of the strata in relation to the underlying meta- 
morphosed Ordovician rocks, and tells of the occurrence of coal seams, 
one about four feet thick. He seems satisfied that there are two horizons 
or levels in the sandstones, showing different groupings of species of 
plants, but both Upper Devonian. 
The following is a list of the species of plants found in the Upper 
Devonian beds of this island:— 
1. Rhizomopteris Nordenskioldi. 
2. Heterangium? sp. 
