171 



Mueller, 1884. — In Papers and Proe. Roy. Soc. Tas., p. 203 (1884), there is a 

 paper " References to Baron Constantin von Ettingshausen's recent Observations on 

 the Tertiary Flora of Australia " by Baron von Mueller. He quotes the 1883 paper 

 already referred to. He chiefly refers to a well-known Derwent River (Tasmania) 

 locality for palseobotanical specimens, and cites R. M. Johnston's labours. The 

 following involved sentence contains a protest : — 



Were I to be allowed to offer a suggestion on the subject, which from its very nature must be 

 perplexing, it would be to recommend a preference of new generic names for all such organic remnants as 

 cannot be put with any degree of certainty along with generic forms now living, nor can safely be placed 

 into clearly-defined fossil genera, as this would not commit us to fix the exact systematic position of any 

 organism, known only from fragments quite insufficient for that strict generic recognition which, for 

 instance, would be expected from dealing with Laurinese, in the sense of living genera of that order, the 

 corresponding exact circumscription of which for fossils, even if flowers and fruits were always or finally 

 obtained, would ever remain an impossibility. 



The paper does not criticise Ettingshausen in detail, and puts forth another plea 

 for the necessity of obtaining flowers and fruits (in addition to leaves) before one can 

 be certain of one's ground in naming them. 



. Deane, 1896. — Mr. Henry Deane, in his Presidential address (Proc. Linn. Soc. 

 N.S.W., xx, 639, 1896), combats the views of Unger, Ettingshausen, &c, " that in 

 Tertiary times, or earlier, there was a universal flora of mixed types, which later on, 

 through the influence of floral climates, became sorted out, so that at the present day 

 distinct regions present distinct peculiarities which at first did not exist." 



At p. 651 he refers to Schimper, Schenk, and Zittel's " Handbuch der Palseon- 

 tologie," Part II (Paheophytologie), (1890), and shows that Zittel (the editor) abandons 

 a number of the Australian genera alleged to have been found in European deposits. 



Speaking of the remains attributed to the capsular Myrtacese (which, of course, includes 

 Eucalyptus), Zittel says there is no necessity to fly to that explanation. . . I have looked carefully 

 through Zittel's work, and I cannot find that the correctness of the identification of any Australian forms 

 is acknowledged except some fossils of the Upper Cretaceous, which have been classed and named 

 Eucalyptus Geinitzi. 



It is to be observed that all resemblances to Australian existing vegetation in the Tertiary flora 

 is looked upon by Hooker, Bentham, Zittel, and many others as fanciful and unproved. As regards the 

 supposed Eucalyptus Geinitzi, it will be noticed that the figure in Zittebs book reminds one of the style of 

 growth of a Eucalypt, but the fruits are by no mean like what exist at the present day. It is, hxrwever, 

 just possible that here we have something like an ancestral example of the capsular Myrtacese, or indeed 

 of the whole group of the Myrtaceaj, for it may be a surned that the fleshy-fruited section of the Order, 

 developed by natural selection out of the hard-fruited one-community of type no doubt implies community 

 of origin. There is. however, an element of doubt about the whole matter, as it is strongly to be suspected 

 that the immediate ancestors of Eucalyptus in Austraba had opposite leaves. 



Be that as it may, however, there is nothing to prove that in Tertiary times any of the Australian 

 groups existed outside Austraba. 



See a note on these fruits, infra, p. 172. They will be discussed at length, with 

 figures, in the next Part (LV) of the present work. 



