EDWARD FORBES. 221 



what Forbes called the ' Kentish Flora,' must have been 

 derived from the north-western provinces of France, and 

 must have migrated into our area at a time when the 

 Strait of Dover had no existence. We have no evidence 

 as to the precise time when the Strait of Dover was 

 formed; but it is not improbable that its formation, 

 as believed by Forbes, was anterior to the severance of 

 the general land-connection between the eastern counties 

 of England and the opposite shores of Belgium and 

 Holland. In this case the Kentish flora would be con- 

 siderably older than the general ' Germanic ' flora of our 

 country. 



The plants of the second or 'Armorican' flora 

 must have migrated into Devonshire, Cornwall, and 

 South-eastern Ireland, at a time when all these regions 

 were connected with one another and also with Brittany 

 and Normandy by land. According to Forbes's view, 

 this must have taken place at a time anterior to the 

 great glacial submergence of Britain; so that the 

 Armorican flora is also more ancient than either the 

 Scandinavian or the Germanic floras. 



With regard to the Asturian flora of the south-west of 

 Ireland there are greater difficulties. The plants of this 

 flora are species which ' at present are forms peculiar to 

 or abundant in the great peninsula of Spain and Portugal, 

 and especially in Asturias.' There are, however, many 

 grounds for believing that these plants migrated from 

 Spain into Ireland at a period when there existed a direct 

 land-connection between these two regions, now separated 

 by such a wide stretch of sea. Difficult as it may appear 

 to establish any reasonable probability of there having 



