3l8 PATAGONIAN EXPEDITIONS I PALAEONTOLOGY. 



should have coexisted with that between Antarctica and South America ; 

 indeed, it is quite possible that the one was interrupted when the other 

 was established. The same refers to the connection of Antarctica with 

 South Africa. 



As regards the latter point, there is no doubt that some evidence in 

 favor of this connection has been found. 1 But this evidence is much less 

 distinct than in the case of the other two continents. Possibly the junc- 

 tion of South Africa with Antarctica is to be sought for far back in Meso- 

 zoic time, or it was, in the Tertiary, only of short duration. As to the 

 reconstruction of this bridge, we must pay due attention to the fact that 

 great depths of the sea have been discovered by the "Valdivia" to the 

 south of the Cape of Good Hope (see Chun, 1900, p. 180 and map by 

 G. Schott, ibid. Lieferung 4). Although great depth of the present sea 

 is by no means a decisive argument against the former existence of land 

 (as for instance Chun believes), it is better, if no other evidence is forth- 

 coming, to be as conservative as possible, and not to interfere with these 

 great depths. In our map we have given two indications for this land 

 bridge : the one going from Enderby, or possibly Wilke's Land, by way 

 of the Kerguelen, Crozet and Prince Edward Islands, the other following 

 the submarine ridge in the South Atlantic indicated by Schott in his map, 

 and connecting southwest Africa with the Falkland Islands by way of 

 Tristan da Cunha. Which one of these bridges, or whether either of them, 

 is correct, we have at present no means of deciding. 2 



Although there is still much room for speculation, we wish to emphasize 

 the fact that the fossil marine animals of Patagonia distinctly point to this 

 old connection of South America with Antarctica at the end of Cretaceous 

 and the beginning of Tertiary times, and that Antarctica in turn was at 

 some time connected with Australia and possibly with New Zealand. As 

 Hedley maintains, there was no continental connection with the latter ; 

 we cannot decide this question, since we treat only of marine literal ani- 

 mals, and for them a close vicinity of the respective literal waters is suffi- 

 cient. The Patagonian fauna demands a theory that assumes a compara- 



1 1 should like particularly to call attention to the presence of the freshwater fish Galaxias 

 capensis at the southwestern corner of Africa (see Weber, 1 897, p. 1 97). 



2 The extremely uneven and rugged bottom of the sea between Enderby Land and the Ker- 

 guelen Islands, as described by Chun, is in favor of the first assumption ; as regards the second, 

 I refer the reader to what Weber (1897, p. 198) says about a direct communication of south- 

 west Africa with v. Ihering's " Archiplata." 



