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224 



THE GEOLOGICAL HISTORY OF PLANTS. 



remains of a moderate climate and certain boreal and 

 arctic forms moving southward continued to exist here 

 and there in somewhat high latitudes, just as similar 

 plants now thrive in Grinnell Land within sight of the 

 snows of the Greenland mountains. A remarkable sum- 

 mary of some of these facts as they relate to England was 

 given by an eminent English botanist, Mr. Carruthers, in 

 his address as President of the Biological Section of the 

 British Association at Birmingham in 1886. At Cromer, 

 on the coast of Norfolk, the celebrated forest-bed of new- 

 er Pliocene age, and containing the remains of a copious 

 mammalian fauna, holds also remains of plants in a state 

 admitting of determination. These have been collected 

 by Mr. Reid, of the Geological Survey, and were reported 

 on by Carruthers, who states that they represent a some- 

 what colder temperature than that of the present day. I 

 quote the following details from the address. 



With reference to the plants of the forest-bed or 

 newer Pliocene he remarks as follows : 



*' Only one species (Trapa nafans, Willd.) has disap- 

 peared from our islands. Its fruits, which Mr. llcid 

 found abundantly in one locality, agree with those of the 

 plants found until recently in the lakes of Sweden. Four 

 species (Prunus speciosa, L., Q^nanthe Tichenalii, Sm., 

 Potamogeton pterophylhis, Sch., and Pinus abies, L.) 

 are found at present only in Europe, and a fifth {Pota- 

 mogeton triclioides, Cham.) extends also to North Ameri- 

 ca ; two species (Peucedanum palustre, Moench, and 

 Pinus sylvestris, L.) are found also in Siberia, while six 

 more {Sanguisorha officinalis, L., Rubies fruticosus, L., 

 Cornus sanguinm, L., Euphorbia amygdaloidcs, L., 

 Quercus robur, L., and Potamogeton crispus, L.) extend 

 into western Asia, and two {Fag us sylvatica, L., and 

 Alnus glutinosa, L.) are included in the Japanese flora. 

 Seven species, while found with the others, enter also into 

 the Mediterranean flora, extending to North Africa : these 



