CHAP. IX 



MILD ARCTIC CLIMATES 



183 



are probably washed out of a thin bed of sand at a height 

 of about twenty or thirty feet above the present sea-level, 

 which is intersected by the river. The geological age of 

 this bed cannot be very great, and it has clearly been 

 formed since the present basin of the Ice Sound, or at 

 least the greater part of it, has been hollowed out by 

 glacial action."^ 



The Miocene Arctic Flora. — One of the most startling 

 and important of the scientific discoveries of the last 

 forty years has been that of the relics of a luxuriant 

 Miocene flora in various parts of the Arctic regions. It is 

 a discovery that was totally unexpected, and is even now 

 considered by many men of science to be completely un- 

 intelligible ; but it is so thoroughly established, and it has 

 such a direct and important bearing on the subjects we are 

 discussing in the present volume, that it is necessary to 

 lay a tolerably complete outline of the facts before our 

 readers. 



The Miocene flora of temperate Europe was very like 

 that of Eastern Asia, J apan, and the warmer part of East- 

 ern North America of the present day. It is very richly 

 represented in Switzerland by well preserved fossil remains, 

 and after a close comparison with the flora of other coun- 

 tries Professor Heer concludes that the Swiss Lower Mio- 

 cene flora indicates a climate corresponding to that of 

 Louisiana, North Africa, and South China, while the 

 Upper Miocene climate of the same country would corre- 

 spond to that of the south of Spain, Southern J apan, and 

 Georgia (U.S. of America). Of this latter flora, found 

 chiefly at (Eninghen in the northern extremity of Switzer- 

 land, 465 species are known, of which 166 species are trees 

 or shrubs, half of them being evergreens. They comprise 

 sequoias like the Californian giant trees, camphor-trees, 

 cinnamons, sassafras, bignonias, cassias, gleditschias, tulip- 

 trees, and many other American genera, together with 

 maples, ashes, planes, oaks, poplars, and other familiar 

 European trees represented by a variety of extinct species. 

 If we now go to the west coast of Greenland in 70° N. Lat. 

 we find abundant remains of a flora of the same sreneral 



^ Geological Magazine, 1876, " Geology of Spitzbergen," p. 267. 



