4 INTEODTJCTION. 



India and the lower members of the Eajmahal series ; ' this is 

 inferred not only from the well-defined differences between the 

 two floras, but from the greater amount of disturbance to -which 

 the Damuda rocks have been exposed. The marked resemblance 

 between the plants of the Eajmahal series of India and those 

 from the Stormberg beds of South Africa, with the Upper Triassic 

 and Ehsetic floras of the north, demonstrates an extraordinary 

 uniformity in the older Mesozoic vegetation, which extended from 

 Northern Europe and America to Africa, India, Australia, and 

 China. This uniformity appears to have persisted throughout 

 the greater part of the Mesozoic era until, with the advent of 

 Angiosperms, drastic and widespread changes were once more 

 effected in the floras of the world. 



It is much to be regretted that our knowledge of Lower Triassic 

 vegetation in Europe is extremely small ; owing to the paucity of 

 evidence furnished by the strata belonging to this critical period 

 in the development of the plant-world, we are unable to follow 

 the steps by which the Mesozoic facies was established. The 

 collection of plants from the Bunter beds of the Vosges, originally 

 described by Schimper & Mougeot in 1844,'^ supplies the greater 

 part of our knowledge of the earlier Triassic vegetation in Europe. 

 "We must not, however, lose sight of such connecting Unks as exist 

 between the Permo-Carboniferous and Triassic floras. The genus 

 Neuropteridium, a plant which may be a true fern, or possibly 

 a surviving member of the Cycadofilices, is represented in the 

 Triassic plant-beds of the Vosges by a species which can hardly 

 be distinguished from one which flourished in South America, 

 South Africa, and India in the Palaeozoic era. Similarly, the 

 genus ScMzomura is represented in the European Triassic vege- 

 tation by a type which cannot be distinguished by any important 

 features from S. gondwanensis from the Lower Gondwana rocks 

 of India. It would seem, then, that some members of the 

 southern Permo-Carboniferous vegetation had become established 

 in Europe during the earlier part of the Triassic era. The genus 

 Pleuromeia, which makes its appearance in Triassic rocks, is known 



1 Medlicott & Blanlord (new edition by E. D. Oldham), (93), p. 177. 

 ' Schimper & Mougeot (44) . 



