444 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



with most of preceding -writers in the vie^v that the migration was 

 j)Ost-Glacial.^ 



IMr. Lyclekker (57 h) does not wish to offer a definite opinion on 

 the subject, though he prefers to incline towards Dr. Wallace's view. 

 Mr. Earrett-Hamilton (4, p. 68) thinks that there is much in 

 favour of the yiew I expressed in my short preliminary note (76 a), 

 but til at an adaptation of Mr. Bulman's views to Ireland might account 

 for the peculiarities of the flora and fauna of the south and west. This 

 brings us to "Mr. Eulman (14 a). He dissents from the conception that 

 the British fauna and flora was totally destroyed during the Glacial 

 Period, and is satisfied that survivals from pre-Glacial times persist 

 in the British Islands to the present day. As the south of England 

 was free fi'om ice, we had, as he observes, '* an area capable of afford- 

 ing an asylum to a considerable number of our plants and animals." 

 I perfectly agree with him, especially in his suggestion that there 

 may have been other areas in the British Islands besides the south of 

 England fitted to preserve temperate life during the Glacial Period. 



The opinions expressed by zoologists, botanists, and geologists is 

 ovei'whelmingly in favour of the post-Glacial'age of the present British 

 fauna. It is believed, even by most of those who admit that the 

 Biitish Islands were inhabited by a very similar fauna and flora in 

 pre-Glacial times, that a vast destruction of animal and vegetable life 

 took place during the Pleistocene Epoch, and that veiy few, if any, 

 species survived the change of climate brought about by the Glacial 

 Period. As I have already indicated, I do not share these views. 

 However, before stating my arguments, not only as to the time of the 

 migration, but as to the changes in the physical geography of Europe 

 on which it depends, T will briefly summarize my conclusions. 



Cojiclmions. 



At the commencement of the latter half of the Pliocene Epoch, or 

 we might say about the time of the deposition of the Bed Crag, the 

 Athinticwas closed in the north by a continuous land-connexion between 

 northern Scandinavia, Spitsbergen, Franz Joseph's Land, Northern 

 Greenland, and Arctic Is'^orth America. (See fig. 6, p. 466.) The 

 Pacific was likewise separated from the Arctic Ocean by a land-barrier 

 between Alaska and Kamtchatka. The Arctic fauna and flora was 

 thus enabled to spread into ^s'ortheni Europe and Xorth America. 

 England was also connected with France and Ireland, and Scandinavia 

 and Ireland with Scotland. (See p. 441). 



' Mr. Carpenter has changed his opinion since (see " Irish 2s'at.," 189^, p. 6-5). 



I 



