February 28, 1896.] 



SCIENCE. 



307 



parts, had a definite connection with one or 

 more of the land masses lying to the north, 

 and the suspicion can hardly be avoided that 

 such connection was, if with nothing else, 

 with at least New Zealand (and through it, 

 with Australia) and Patagonia. In the frag- 

 mented parts of Graham Land archipelago 

 and the outlying South Orkney and South 

 Georgian islands, we seem to have the bond 

 of connection with the South Amer'ican 

 main; or, more specifically, a line of curva- 

 ture of the great Andean chain, which, in 

 its broken parts, can still be traced far be- 

 yond its present continental termination. If 

 this concept is a true one, it places before 

 us a parallel to the Andean curvature in the 

 northern part of the South American Con- 

 tinent, where the mountain system is de- 

 flected off into the broken mass of the Lesser 

 Antilles; to the Aleutian flexure of the Cor- 

 dilleran system of ISTorth America ; and to 

 the ' Apennine- Atlas ' and ' Carpathian- Bal- 

 kan ' flexures of the Alpine mountains, the 

 nature of which has been so clearly stated 

 by Suess. In fact, it is hardly possible that 

 any very extensive meridianal or latitudi- 

 nal mountain chain could have been forced 

 up through contractional force without some 

 such deflection being represented in one or 

 more parts of its course; and where these 

 deflections are found they are almost cer- 

 tain to be areas of breakage. The dis- 

 ruption of the Andean system is still (or has 

 until recently been) taking place, as is evi- 

 denced in a portion of the Chilian archipel- 

 ago. 



Antarctica Palceontology. Prof. "W. B. Scott, 



Princeton University. 



It is a truism that the most satisfactory 

 evidence concerning the former existence of 

 land connections which have long since dis- 

 appeared beneath the sea, is to be derived 

 from the distribution of land animals, re- 

 cent and fossil. In the northern hemis- 

 phere this evidence is very extensive for all 



of the great land masses, and for those later 

 divisions of geological time in which terres- 

 trial life began to play an important part. 

 In the southern hemisphere the case is un- 

 fortunately difl'erent, only South America 

 having, as yet, yielded numerous and well 

 preserved remains of Tertiary mammals. 

 Pleistocene fossils, which have an impor- 

 tant though somewhat inconclusive bear- 

 ing upon the problem of the Antarctic con- 

 tinent, occur in other regions, such as Mada- 

 gascar, Australia and New Zealand, but the 

 evidence is still fragmentary and leaves 

 much to be desired. 



In the Permian we first find indications 

 of a type of fossils, common to the southern 

 hemisphere and distinct from the contem- 

 porary life of the northern. This is the 

 much discussed Glossopteris Flora, char- 

 acterized by the fern of that name, and by 

 an assemblage of plants which is more like 

 the Triassic than the Permian of the north- 

 ern continent. The Glossopteris Flora has 

 been found in India, South Africa, Austra- 

 lia and, quite lately, in the Argentine Ee- 

 public, and obviously points to an Antarctic 

 center of distribution. Though the distribu- 

 tion of the Glossopteris Flora does not demon- 

 strate that the lands in which it occurs were 

 all connected together, yet it renders such 

 connection probable. Judging from the an- 

 alogy of the existing land masses, it seems 

 likely that the connection was rather by 

 means of a circumpolar continent with 

 northward extensions than through east 

 and west land-bridges, or a great single con- 

 tinent occupying the site of the Indian, 

 South Atlantic and South Pacific Oceans. 



The evidence of Mesozoic fossils is very 

 unsatisfactory. Lydekker has called atten- 

 tion to the likeness between the Jurassic 

 Dinosaurs of India, South Africa and Pata- 

 gonia, and, so far as it goes, this fact would 

 indicate a general persistence of the same 

 land connections as those which obtained 

 in Permian times. 



