SoHAiti'T — Former Land-iSridfie between N. Europe and N. America. 11 



Scotland are caught up and carried towards the iiurtli-oaHl right away from 

 the Faroes. 



Since Darwin's classical experiments, birds have always boon quoted as 

 very important factors in the transmission of si^eils from tlie mainlaTid to an 

 island. Nevertheless, actual examination of birds (hiring their migratory flights 

 had never been made. Now we know, at any rate, that the migration of birds 

 fronr Europe in tlic direction of Iceland is inconsiderable. Secondly, for at 

 least four or five years the alimentary canals, the beaks, feet, and feathers of all 

 the migratory birds caught at Danish lighthouse stations have been thoroughly 

 investigated, with the result that the birds were found to migrate on an empty 

 stomach, and were almost always clean externally. Dr. Knud Andersen, 

 who conducted these inquiries, is of opinion that migratory birds are hardly 

 of any importance as disseminators of plants. 



A summary of the above arguments leads Dr. Ostenfeld to the conclusion 

 Lliat the principal portion of the flora of the Faroes must have travelled from 

 the mainland of Europe on a bridge of continuous land. But assuming that 

 the Ice Age destroyed the flora of the islands, he takes for granted, with 

 Professor James Geikie and Mr. Simmons, that this belt of land was Post- 

 Glacial in age, notwithstanding that the disappearance of Glacial conditions 

 in Europe is often synchronized with the submergence of the land-bridge.' 



Much the same view is advocated by Professor Drude, except that he 

 places the age of the land-connexion further back — to the Glacial period 

 itself. = The theory of the existence of an ancient land-bridge between 

 northern Europe and North America has likewise been adopted by 

 Dr. Schulz,' who argues that an immigration of plants from arctic America 

 to Europe took place by means of two laud-connexions. One of these 

 joined Greenland with Iceland, the Faroes, and Scotland ; the other with 

 Spitsbergen, Franz Joseph Laud, Novaya Zemlya, and northern Eussia. 

 He contends that these land-bridges existed during the greater part of late 

 Tertiary times until the beginning of the Pliocene period. 



The question of the supposed survival of plants through the Ice Age in 

 Greenland largely depends on the problem whether or no tlie glaciers of that 

 country had a vastly greater extension formerly than they have at present, 

 and covered the whole of the land now free from ice. That the latter has 

 never been entirely invaded by ice has been clearly demonstrated by the 

 leader of the German Greenland Expedition, Dr. E. von Drygalski. The 



' Ostenfeld, C. H., •' I'hyto-geographionl Studies," pp. 115-118. 

 -Diudc, 0., " PflanzenReographischo Anhultspiinktc," p. 329. 

 ^Sclmlz, A., " Pfliinzenwelt Mitteleuropas," p. 1. 



