214 PROF. J, LOGAN LOBLEY, F.G.S., F.R.G.S., ON 
Lydekker lias recently examined and determined the remains 
of fifty-five species of edentates from the Pleistocene beds of 
Patagonia. In North America have been found Megatherium, 
Megalonyx and Mylodon, and from the Pliocene of California, 
Marsh has described the genus Morotherium. 
From the Miocene Santa Cruz beds, Scott has determined 
species of twenty-nine genera of Edentata. These were very 
much smaller animals than the Pleistocene species before 
known, and approach the size of the South American living 
'edentates. 
Of Marsupialia which now gives the opossums to both South 
and North America, there are the remains of numerous species 
in the Brazilian caves, and the genus Didelphys has been found 
in the Post Pliocene deposits of South Carolina. The Miocene 
beds of Santa Cruz give a remarkable assemblage of Marsupial 
fossils, for Sinclair has described twenty species, while no less 
than eighty-seven had been previously named by Ameghino. 
No remains of the lowest order of Mammalia, Monotremata, 
have been as yet discovered in America, and as there is no 
living American species, we have no evidence of a monotreme 
■ever having existed in the New World. 
Of remains of the class Aves, or birds, little need be said. 
The prolific cave deposits of Brazil have yielded many small 
avian bones from which thirty-four species of birds have been 
determined, including two species of Rhea and a species of the 
curious genus Opisthocoma, both genera being exclusively 
American. The turkey, Meleagris, has been found in both Post 
Pliocene and Miocene deposits. 
The Quaternary and Tertiary Eeptilia and Amphibia of 
America have not given many species, though tortoises are 
numerous in the Miocene and Eocene of North America, and 
several species of crocodile and a chameleon have been found 
in the Eocene. This is important, since there are no chameleons 
now in America. A large salamander, allied to the living 
Menopomo of North America, has also been discovered. 
Former Land Connections, Atlantis, etc. 
That America has been connected by land with the Old 
World will be evident, I think, from the facts that have now 
been stated, and that the animals at present living there have 
had their origin either directly or by descent mainly from 
species which have inhabited the eastern hemisphere, can 
scarcely be doubted. But there remains the question, what 
and where was that former connecting land ? Was it the 
