NOTE and COMMENT 



The Ancient Arctic Flora. — Most people are familiar 

 with the fact that coal is found at many places in both the 

 Arctic and Antarctic regions which would seem to indicate 

 pretty clearly that at some earlier period the climate in such 

 regions was much milder than at present, since coal is formed 

 of the remains of plants and plants cannot thrive in these ice- 

 bound regions at present. Some geologists have attempted to 

 show that the plants which formed this coal did not grow in 

 the region but were carried to their present resting place by 

 some large river or by ocean currents. This theory seems 

 utterly untenable, however, for in many places the fossil coal 

 plants are still rooted in the mud as in life. Many of the plants 

 are so well preserved that the genus, and even the species, can 

 be determined. Among the plant remains found in Spitzbergen 

 are included species Oif redwood, cypress, maple, poplar, willow, 

 alder, birch, hornbeam, hazel, beech, oak, elm, plane, magnolia, 

 basswood, walnut, hickoy and ash, as well as many herbaceous 

 plants. 



Fern Bulletin in the Argentine. — Of the thirty-one 

 complete sets of the Fern Bulletin known to exist, three are 

 owned outside of the United States. Until recently we have 

 been unable to locate the single set owned in South America, 

 ovving to the fact that it was purchased through a German 

 agent, but a note from Dr. Cristobel M. Hicken, Professor of 

 Botany in the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina, apprises 

 us of the fact that the set is preserved in Dr. Hicken's private 

 natural history museum, ''Darwinion." The museum is one of 



