1910-1911.] 



395 



accurately carried out, that a Club like ours, though mainly 

 composed of amateur workers, can best help along the greater 

 and more complete work of the British Association, with which 

 we have long been in close connection, or the more national 

 Irish work of the Royal Irish Academy. In the slides which I 

 am about to show you, I wish to call your special attention to the 

 evidence which the distribution of many animals affords of old 

 land connections — or land-bridges as they are sometimes called — 

 between this country and the Continent, and especially between 

 the Britannic area and America, the latter being a connection not 

 accepted by many Geologists. I am afraid the Geologist too 

 often ignores the help which the Zoologist and Botanist can give 

 in this direction. While the modern student in these groups has 

 usually obtained a fair knowledge of general geological facts, the 

 average Geologist seems to take little interest in many zoological 

 or botanical facts which have a distinct bearing on Geology. 

 Among others, I need only point to the enormous multiplication 

 of species in fossil nomenclature, which would be avoided if the 

 Palaeontologist gave more attention to variation due to environ- 

 ment or other causes. 



The President then proceeded to explain a series of very 

 beautiful illustrative and diagrammatic slides which were thrown 

 on the screen, commencing first with the Lusitanian or Southern 

 types of animals and plants which seem to have entered the 

 country in very ancient times over a land connection, now long 

 gone, between the South of Ireland and the Spanish peninsula. 

 Examples, such as the Arbutus, the Kerry Saxifrage, the Spotted 

 Slug of Kerry, and the Hysena, were given, the latter having left 

 its remains in some of the southern caves. Next the Western or 

 American elements of our fauna and flora were referred to, such 

 as the Killarney Fern, the not long extinct Great Auk, and 

 some Land-Shells. Passing to the Northern or Arctic survivals 

 in our fauna and flora he showed the distribution of such animals 

 as the Freshwater Pearl-Mussel, the Irish Hare, the Mountain 



