GLACIAL CONDITIONS IN THE PALAEOZOIC EEA, ETC. 261 



present case, with a paper dealing with India, South Africa, and 

 Australia, and which raised such questions as the value of fossil 

 plants as evidence of geological age, and of the recurrence of glacial 

 conditions, it was to be expected that the discussion would be wide, 

 lively, and possibly warm. 



Dr. Selwtn said that conglomerate beds similar to those referred 

 to at Bacchus Marsh were very largely developed in Gipps Land, 

 where they formed mountains 3000-4000 feet high. Lepido- 

 dendron and some other indistinct fossil plants were found in the 

 associated strata, but none of the Eacchus-Marsh forms. He 

 thought it possible the conglomerates were of the same age, though 

 on the evidence of the plants they had been considered different. 

 Glacial action may have operated in their formation, though he had 

 not observed any evidence of it. 



The much discussed Stony Creek section is parallelled in British 

 Columbia, where a Tertiary flora is interbedded with a Mesozoie 

 marine fauna. 



Mr. Caeruthers remarked that this was not a question of strati- 

 grai)hy, but as to the value of botanical and zoological data in 

 determining the age of strata. It appeared to him that the remains 

 of plants might indicate the age even more than those of animals. 

 It was not a question of the replacement of the Carboniferous flora 

 of Europe by a flora of the same age but of a different facies, for, 

 though the Lepidodendra of Australia were Devonian, there was a 

 Carboniferous flora of the same type as that of Europe in South 

 Africa (Karoo beds), consisting of Lejndodendi^a, Siffillarice, Cala- 

 mites, and Ferns ; and in addition there was present this later Glosso- 

 pteris-^ora. with a Mesozoie facies. In South Africa, India, and 

 Australia this flora is placed, on zoological evidence, at a lower level 

 than it ought to occupy. 



Mr. Lydekker wished to call attention to two points bearing on 

 the present paper. In the Kashmir Himalaya the Kuling series 

 seems to represent the Lower Froductus -lim.estone, and beneath it 

 there is a considerable thickness of traps underlain by the Blaini 

 conglomerate, which closely resembles a glacial boulder-bed. This 

 boulder-bed appears to be the equivalent of that in the Salt Eange ; 

 and other boulder-beds lower down in the series j)oint to the pre- 

 valence of still earlier glacial conditions. Mr. Lydekker also called 

 attention to the homotaxy of the groups of the Gondwanas, and showed 

 a perfect agreement between the age indicated from the considera- 

 tion of the vertebrate fossils and that arrived at upon other grounds 

 by Dr. AYaagen and Mr. Oldham. Th€ sequence thus obtained in- 

 dicates representative groups from the age of the Lower Jura (Kota) 

 to that of the Carboniferous (Talchir). In South Africa, also, we 

 get a complete series from the Jura, to the Palaeozoic. 



Prof. T. R. Jones remarked that in the case of the Stormberg he 

 regarded the presence of Lepidodendron as a myth. The Karoo 

 beds contain vertebrate remains, including highly organized Eeptiles, 

 and it seemed to him that these furnished better evidence than a 

 flora. He referred to the evidence adduced by the late Mr. Stow 



