310 HISTORICAL PALZONTOLOGY. 
plants are found many trees, such as Conifers, Beeches, Oaks, 
Maples, Plane-trees, Walnuts, Magnolias, &c., with numerous 
shrubs, ferns, and other smaller plants. With regard to the 
Miocene flora of the Arctic regions, Sir Charles Lyell remarks 
that ‘more than thirty species of Coniferee have been found, 
including several Sequoias (allied to the gigantic Wellingtonia 
of California), with species of Zhwjopsis and Salisburia, now 
peculiar to Japan. There are also beeches, oaks, planes, 
poplars, maples, walnuts, limes, and even a magnolia, two 
cones of which have recently been obtained, proving that 
this splendid evergreen not only lived but ripened its fruit 
within the Arctic circle. Many of the limes, planes, and 
oaks were large-leaved species; and both flowers and fruits, 
besides immense quantities of leaves, are in many cases pre- 
served. Among the shrubs are many evergreens, as Azdro- 
meda, and two extinct genera, Daphnogene and M1‘ Cliniockia, 
with fine leathery leaves, together with hazel, blackthorn, 
holly, logwood, and hawthorn. A species of Zamia (Zamiites) 
grew in the swamps, with Potamogeton, Sparganium, and 
Menyanthes; while ivy and vines twined around the forest- 
trees, and broad-leaved ferns grew beneath their shade. Even 
in Spitzbergen, as far north as lat. 78° 56’, no less than ninety- 
five species of fossil plants have been obtained, including 
Taxodium of two species, hazel, poplar, alder, beech, plane- 
tree, and lime. Such a vigorous growth of trees within 12° of 
the pole, where now a dwarf willow and a few herbaceous 
plants form the only vegetation, and where the ground is 
covered with almost perpetual snow and ice, is truly remark- 
able.” 
Taking the Miocene flora as a whole, Dr Heer concludes 
from his study of about 3000 plants contained in the Euro- 
pean Miocene alone, that the Miocene plants indicate tropical 
or sub-tropical conditions, but that there is a striking inter- 
mixture of forms which are at present found in countries 
widely removed from one another. It is impossible to state 
with certainty how many of the Miocene plants belong to 
existing species, but it appears that the larger number are 
extinct. According to Heer, the American types of plants 
are most largely represented in the Miocene flora, next those 
of Europe and Asia, next those of Africa, and lastly those of 
Australia. Upon the whole, however, the Miocene flora of 
Europe is mostly nearly allied to the plants which we now 
find inhabiting the warmer parts of the United States; and 
this has led to the suggestion that in Miocene times the 
Atlantic Ocean was dry land, and that a migration of Ameri- 
