ANNTVERSAKT ADDRESS OF tHE PEESIDENT. 7 I 



of this doctrine. The general structure of the piscivorous bear of 

 the Arctic regious, and of the frugivorous bear of the Malay pen- 

 insula, the osteology of the deer of Lapland and India respectively, 

 exhibit no such differences as would lead us to infer their diver- 

 sity of habits and surroundings. It has long been known that, 

 during the Glacial Period, elephants, rhinoceroses, and hippopotami, 

 with lions, tigers, and hj-senas, flourished under subarctic conditions. 

 The deep-sea researches have so added to our knowledge concerning 

 the conditions under which different forms of life exist — especially 

 those belonging to marine faunas — as to demand a complete recon- 

 sideration of the conclusions usually accepted by geologists. For 

 there is a general consensus of opinion among the naturalists who 

 have studied the different groups of the deep-sea faunas, that, con- 

 trary to what might have been anticipated from the very remarkable 

 conditions under which they live, the deep-sea forms belong, for 

 the most part, to the same families, and often indeed to the same 

 genera, as shallow-water forms. 



The bearing of this important conclusion upon the great problem 

 of the distribution of marine forms of life is obvious. Botanists 

 have naturally availed themselves of the proved occurrences of colder 

 climates in many areas to explain difficult facts of plant-distribution, 

 such as the occurrence of well-known arctic species on the tops of 

 mountains in what are now temperate, or even tropical, districts. 

 But zoologists, now that they know it to be possible for littoral 

 forms to stray into abysmal portions of the ocean, and then subse- 

 quently, without profound modification, to re-emerge in other littoral 

 areas, may find a clue to some very remarkable facts concerning the 

 distribution of marine forms of life, without having to resort to 

 explanations which seem necessary in the case of the terrestrial 

 types, which appear to be more dependent than the marine ones on 

 the circumstances of their environment. 



The whole problem of the distribution of marine forms of life 

 requires indeed to be worked out afresh on the basis of these new 

 discoveries ; and when this is done, the first to profit by the new 

 generalizations will be geologists, who have long been confronted by 

 seemingly insuperable difficulties in connexion with this problem. 



As for the very prevalent notions that Ammonites and Belemnites, 

 Trigonise and Brachiopods, with Ichthyosaurs, Piiosaurs, and Plesio- 

 saurs, could only have lived in warm, if not actually tropical, 

 climates, I know of no grounds whatever for any such belief. The 

 nearest living allies of the Invertebrates referred to flourish at con- 



