PLANT-BEAKING SEEIES OE INDIA. 535 



Cutch fossils to African forms ; and Dr. Stoliczka and Mr. Griesbach 

 have shown that of the Cretaceous fossils of the Umtafuni river in 

 Natal, the majority (twenty- two out of thirty-five described forms) 

 are identical with species from Southern India. Now the plant- 

 bearing series of India and the Karoo and part of the Uitenhage 

 formation of Africa are in all probability of freshwater origin, both 

 indicating the existence of a large land area around, from the waste 

 of which these deposits are derived. "Was this land continuous 

 between the two regions? and is there any thing in the present 

 physical geography of the Indian Ocean which would suggest its 

 probable position? Further, what was the connexion between this 

 land and Australia, which we must equally assume to have existed 

 in Permian times ? And, lastly, are there any peculiarities in the 

 existing fauna and flora of India, Africa, and the intervening islands 

 which would lend support to the idea of a former connexion more 

 direct than that which now exists between Africa and South India 

 and the Malay peninsula. The speculation here put forward is no 

 new one. It has long been a subject of thought in the minds of 

 some Indian and European naturalists, among the former of whom 

 I may mention my brother and Dr. Stoliczka, their speculations 

 being grounded on the relationship and partial identity of the faunas 

 and floras of past times, not less than on that existing community 

 of forms which has led Mr. Andrew Murray, Mr. Searles Y. "Wood, 

 jun., and Professor Huxley to infer the existence of a Miocene con- 

 tinent occupying a part of the Indian Ocean. Indeed, all that I can 

 pretend to aim at in this paper is to endeavour to give some additional 

 definition and extension to the conception in its geological aspect. 



With regard to the geographical evidence, a glance at the map 

 will show that from the neighbourhood of the west coast of India to 

 that of the Seychelles, Madagascar, and the Mauritius extends a line 

 of coral atolls and banks, including Adas bank, the Laccadives, 

 Maldives, the Chagos group, and the Saya de Mulha, all indicating 

 the existence of a submerged mountain-range or ranges. The Sey- 

 chelles, too, are mentioned by Mr. Darwin* as rising from an ex- 

 tensive and tolerably level bank, having a depth of between 20 and 

 40 fathoms ; so that, although now partly encircled by fringing reefs, 

 they may be regarded as a virtual extension of the same submerged 

 axis. Further west the Cosmoledo and Comoro Islands consist of 

 atolls and islands surrounded by barrier reefs ; and these bring us 

 pretty close to the present shores of Africa and Madagascar. It 

 seems at least probable that in this chain of atolls, banks, and barrier 

 reefs we have indicated the position of an ancient mountain- chain, 

 which possibly formed the back-bone of a tract of later Palaeozoic, 

 Mesozoic, and early Tertiary land, being related to it much as the 

 Alpine and Himalayan system is to the Europaeo-Asiatie continent f, 



* ' Coral Reefs/ Appendix, p. 185. 



t This idea, based of course on Mr. Darwin's discovery, has been also speci- 

 fically suggested by Mr. Andrew Murray (see the ' Geographical Distribution of 

 Mammalia,' p. 25), and by Mr. Searles V. Wood, jun. (see Phil. Mag. 1862. 

 vol. xxiii. p. 388). 



