254 H. El. Soicorth — The Mammoth in Europe. 



cinerea ; and among tlie species still living there, the red fir, the 

 white birch, the hazel and the sycamore, the white fir, aspen, silver 

 poplar, pedunculated oak, hornbeam, elm, lime tree and spindle tree, 

 the Salix monandra, fragilis, aurita, siminalis, and especially Salix 

 cinerea, the Cornns sangiiinea, the Rliamnus frangula and catharticiis, 

 the box, the Vaccinmm uliginosum, the great manna grass (Glyceria 

 spectabilis) the reed and the harts' tongue {Scolopendrum officinale). 

 Except the extinct species and the box, all these plants now live in 

 Wurtemberg ; the sycamore is not found at Canstadt however, but in 

 the mountains, and the whortleberry in the peat bogs. " On the 

 whole," says Heer, '•' climatal conditions are implied in the flora of 

 Canstadt similar to those now prevalent in the same locality." In 

 old turbaries of Ivr^a and in drift debris near Mur in Styria trunks 

 of the Siberian pine (Pinus cembra) have been found, and near 

 Schwerzenbach, in the Canton of Zurich, in drift loam, Betnla nana, 

 Salix retiisa, Salix reticulata, Salix polaris. Polygonum viviioarum and 

 Dryas octopetala (Heer, op. cit. pp. 206-7). This more northern 

 flora is perhaps due to the proximity of the Alps, or it perhaps 

 belongs to a somewhat earlier period. It is very probable indeed 

 that the white clay band above the Bovey Tracey Lignites, which 

 was described by Professor Heer and others in the 152nd volume of 

 the Philosophical Transactions, is of the same age as the bi'ick-earths 

 and white marls in which the Mammoth occurs. It is interesting 

 to note that Professor Heer recovered from this clay leaves of the 

 Betida nana, and of three species of Salices wliich he identified 

 respectively with Salix cinerea, Salix repens, and Salix ambigua. 

 The first of these points to Devonshire then having had a colder 

 climate than now, it not being found south of Scotland; the evidence 

 of the willow leaves, says Professor Heer, is the same, indicating that 

 at this time Bovey was a cold peat moor. He remarks that Salix 

 cinerea is one of the commonest species at Canstadt {op. cit. p. 1044). 



M. Saporta's researches have been devoted to the French strata, 

 and he communicated a most interesting paper to the Stockholm 

 meeting of Anthropologists in 1874, on the flora of the tuffs of 

 Moret in the Seine Yalley, already referred to. The following 

 plants have been found there : Scolopendrium officinale, Gorylus 

 avellana, Salix cinerea. Salix fragilis, Popidus canescens, Ficus carica, 

 Fraxinus excelsior, Viburnum tinus, Hedera helix. Clematis vitalba, 

 Taxus sempervirens, Acer pseudo-platanus, Euomjmus Europceus, 

 Euonymiis lalifolius, Cercis siliquastrum. Of these fifteen species, 

 five are not now found at Moret, namely, Ficus carica, Viburnum 

 tinus, Taxus sempervirens, Euonymus latifolius, and Cercis siliquastrum. 



The whole of the plants found at Moret are also found at Canstadt, 

 except the Cercis, the Viburnum, and the Ficus. The co-existence of 

 these species, says M. Saporta, proves very clearly that, notwith- 

 standing the variations due to latitude, Europe from the Mediter- 

 ranean to its central districts offered fewer contrasts, and was more 

 uniform than it is now. A more equable climate, damp and clement, 

 allowed the Acer pseudo-platanus and the fig to live associated 

 together near Paris, as it allowed the reindeer and hyaena. The 



