of Ancient Antarctic Life. 117 



arctica,' which may have been supplied with these snails, as 

 well as with certain marsupials, fishes, &c. from Australia, 

 and subsequently became united at Cape Horn, transferring 

 the fauna. The connexion could hardly have been in reverse 

 order, or why should not Edentates and Hystricomorph 

 Rodents have invaded Australia?" 



The opposite view, viz. that Antarctica transferred a fauna 

 from America to Australia, is favoured by the facts that the 

 fossil marsupials from the Patogonian Eocene antedate * any 

 fossil marsupials recorded from Australia, that the marsupi- 

 alia dawn upon the Australian horizon as a highly differen- 

 tiated group, and that Prof. Spencer has demonstrated f " that 

 the diprotodonts had their origin in the Euronotian region," 

 meaning that their centre of dispersal lay to the south-east of 

 Australia. Von Ihering has suggested | that a large area of 

 South America was separated in Mesozoic times from the 

 remainder, and maintained a distinct fauna and flora. If 

 from this tract, which he terms Archiplata, were excluded, as 

 he holds, placental mammals, it may have peopled Australia 

 with marsupials, and yet not have transferred tlience Eden- 

 tates or Hystricomorph Rodents. 



The relation of Antarctica to African lands is a subject on 

 which an Australian student has littie chance to form an 

 opinion. Perhaps the faint though real affinity (as shown in 

 the distribution of the mollusks EndodontidEe, Rhytididse, 

 and Acavinae) would be explicable on the supposition that 

 before either America or Australia had united with Antarctica, 



* This statement is derived from the following data, for which I am 

 chiefly indebted to the kindness of my friend Mr. W. S. Dun, Assistant 

 Palaeontologist to the Geological Survey of N. S. W., himself the author 

 of important papers on the subject. The oldest described Australian 

 mammalia are Pliocene, viz. Omithorkpichus maximus, Dun, and Echidna 

 robusta, Dun (Records Geol. Survey, N. S. W. iv. p. 119), from this 

 colony. From Victoria Prof. M' Coy has claimed as Pliocene (' Prodro- 

 mus,' " Palaeontology of Victoria," decades i.-vii.) Pkascolomys plocenius, 

 M'Coy, Diprotodon longiceps, M'Ooy, Macropus titan, Owen, and Pro- 

 cuptodon goliah, Owen. Some bones recognized by Johnston (Geol. 

 Tasmania, p. 261) and Tate (Proc. Roy. Soc. N. S. W. 1893, p. 168) as 

 Halmaturus, from the Eocene of Table Cape, Tasmania, can hardly be 

 discussed till they have been studied, described, and named. Yet on 

 a priori grounds the Diprotodontia can scarcely be supposed to have so 

 far proceeded on the path of differentiation from the radical Polyproto- 

 dont stock as to have evolved into Halmaturus at the early date of the 

 Eocene ; further, the sea-shells of this deposit form an incongruous 

 environment for a wallaby. For a list of the numerous marsupials ex- 

 tracted from the Upper Eocene beds of Santa Cruz, South America, see 

 Zittel, Geol. Mag. x. p. 456. 



t Report Austr. Assoc. Adv. Science, 1892, p. 118. 



X Trans. New Zealand Institute, 1891, xxiv. p. 434. 



