1884.] Construction of a Cliapter in the History of the Earth. 191 



At the base of the series, are beds whose marine fauna indicates a 

 Devonian age ; above these, come beds which contain a flora consisting 

 principally of such genera as Lepidodendron, Bhacopteris, and Calamites, 

 among which occurs a single species of Glossopteris.^ Above these, but 

 still below beds in which a marine fauna of Carboniferous type is found, 

 there is a flora which, judged by European standards, is Mezozoic in 

 facies. At the top of the Newcastle series, to which the beds just men- 

 tioned belong, a more abundant flora is found, which presents many re- 

 lationships to that of our Indian Damudas : in both, Glossopteris is a do- 

 minant type, both contain the Glossopteris hrowniana and two other 

 species allied to Damuda forms : Sphenopteris, which in the New- 

 castle beds is represented by six species, is only represented in the 

 Damudas by one (S. polymorpha, Fstm.), which, however, is said to be 

 more closely allied to the Australian S. alata than to any European 

 form : the only species of Phyllotheca is allied to the Damuda P. indica, 

 and the common occurrence of Vertehraria in both is another link. That 

 this relationship is not so close as was at one time believed, I readily 

 admit, but nevertheless the relationship is real, and, though it may be 

 presumptuous to express an opinion at variance with that of the 

 talented palaeontologist of the Geological Survey of India, I must say 

 that to me the relationship seems far closer than that which unites 

 the Damudas to the Trias of Europe. 



Above the Newcastle beds, come the Hawskbury beds, which have 

 yielded but two species of ferns, one of which (Sphenopteris alata, Bgt.), 

 however, is allied to a Damuda species. Above the Hawksbury, come 

 the Wianamatta beds, which have yielded six species of plants, no 

 less than three of which are allied to Damuda forms. 



It is thus evidently impossible to correlate, on pal^ontological 

 grounds alone, these beds directly with any of our Indian horizons, but, 

 like the Indian Talchirs, the Hawksbury beds contain certain beds of fine 

 clay through which boulders of all sizes are scattered promiscuously in 

 a manner that can only be attributed to the agency of floating ice. In 

 Victoria, there are beds which similarly indicate the existence of a severe 

 climate at the time of their deposition, and these — the Bacchus Marsh beds 

 — have yielded three species of Gancjamopteris, of which one is identical 

 with, and the other two are closely allied to, Talchir species. The Bacchus 

 Marsh beds have not yielded a single species common to themselves and 

 to the Hawksbury beds, but this is of little importance, as it is impossible 

 to suppose that the entire flora of the Bacchus Marsh period consisted 



* There is some doubt attaching to the correctness of this statement. The 

 Glossiopteris was obtained from a different locality and possibly from a nowcr series 

 of beds than the others. 



