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the South Polar regions. I confine myself to dealing with 

 some points arising from a comparison of the life found in 

 those scattered lands : Mr. Griffiths, of Melbourne, gives some 

 interesting information, based on the observations of Darwin, 

 Wallace, Button, Sir Joseph Hooker, and others. Tims 44 per 

 cent, of the New Zealand flora is of Antarctic origin ; whilst 

 the Auckland, Campbell, and Macquarie Islands all support 

 Antarctic plants, some of which have never reached New Zea- 

 land. The flora and fauna of Kergulen, the Crozets, and 

 Marion Island are almost identical. Tristan d'Acunha has 58 

 species of marine molluscs, of which 13 are also found in S. 

 America, 6 or 7 in New Zealand, and 4 in South Africa. 

 Temperate S. America has 74 genera of plants in common with 

 New Zealand and 11 of its species are identical. 



Dr. Hooker, writing of the botany of Tierra del Fuego, 

 says : — " The Fuegian flora possesses some other points of 

 interest when viewed in comparison with that of the Antarctic 

 Islands lying to the south of New Zealand, also with that of 

 the Falkland Islands, S. Georgia, Tristan d'Acunha, and 

 Kerguelen Island. All these countries, though the latter is 

 distant some 5,000 miles, seem to have borrowed many plants 

 from this, the great botanical centre of the Antarctic Ocean. 

 And it is a still more surprising fact that the vegetation of 

 Fuegia includes a considerable number of English plants, 

 although 106 degrees of ocean roll between, and some of the 

 species in question inhabit no intermediate latitudes." The 

 inference drawn from these remarkable facts is that at one 

 time a large extent of land existed in the Southern Ocean, 

 that it has subsided beneath the ocean, leaving only isolated 

 peaks as evidence of its former existence. The investigations 

 of the Challenger staff show that Kerguelen, its adjacent 

 islands, the Crozets, Marion, and other islands stand on one 

 common submerged plateau rising to within 1,500 fathoms of 

 the surface. These considerations, in view of the recent 

 discoveries of leaf remains in our Tertiary Beds of species 

 related to oaks, laurels, elms, &c, might furnish our friend 

 Mr. Johnston with material for a paper on our fossil flora 

 and its relations to exotic plants. 



Seeing that no one has set foot on the Antarctic Continent, 

 we are not quite sure whether any land animals exist there 

 or not; none have been seen, nor have any land birds, 

 although sea birds are numerous — in fact, the" islands lying 

 between 50deg. and 60deg. seem to be the chief breeding 

 places of the albatros. Penguins are very numerous — that 

 is, the common variety ; but there is one species which attains 

 a weight of 751b. and upwards, which seem scarce. 



Whales are abundant, especially within the Antarctic 

 Circle. Boss, Wilkes, D'Urville, and Nares all report having 



