Carboniferous Glaciation , Etc .— White. 323 
the disappearance of the more delicate Lepidodendra, Sigil- 
larise, Stigmarise, and other paleozoic genera and species was 
accompanied by the development of hardier types, such as 
Glossopteris, Gangamopteris, Vertebraria, etc., 2 which afterward 
became distributed over the world and formed the basis, of a 
great part at least, of the mesozoic flora of the globe. This 
early flora is known by reason of its principal and character¬ 
istic genus, as the Glossopteris-R ora. The elements and dis¬ 
tribution of the fauna of this ancient continent have been 
worked out in a most thorough manner by Waagen. 3 Thus 
the prototypes of the European Jurassic and Cretaceous floras 
found the conditions necessary to their development in the 
southern hemisphere during the change of climate which 
accompanied the Carboniferous glacial epoch. 
It has always been the argument of the paleobotanists, in 
support of their view of the later age of the terranes, that the 
Carboniferous faunas “ lasted on ” into mesozoic time, citing 
for illustration the archaic facies of the present fauna and 
flora of Australia. Against this, however, stands the evidence^ 
that the fauna and flora of the upper mesozoic and Tertiary 
were similar and related to those of the rest of the world. 
Moreover* the certain mutations of the organic life due 
to continental subsidence and elevations during the de¬ 
position of the vast terranes of the long section of geo¬ 
logical time from the Carboniferous to the close of the Ter¬ 
tiary, make such an explanation highly improbable, if not 
totally unreasonable. The study of the Tertiary flora of Aus¬ 
tralia by Ettingshausen, 4 and Johnston, 5 shows that flora to 
be modern in its aspect, resembling that of the other conti¬ 
nents, with relations in all. The characteristic mesozoic gen¬ 
era of ferns, Thinnfeldia, Alethopteris, Pecopteris, Neurop- 
teris, Sphenopteris, Tseniopteris, and Cyclopteris are wanting, 
and all the cycads, horsetails and conifers, Podozamites, Phyl- 
2 See Feistmantel chart, supra, p.— 
3 Die Carbone Eiszeit. Jahrb. K.-K. geol. Reichsanst., xxxvii, 
Wien, 1888, p. 143, etc. 
4 C. Von Ettingshausen. Beitrage zur Tertiarflora der Vorwelt, Die 
Tertiarflora Australiens. Denkschr. d. k. Akad. Wiss. Wien., math.- 
nat. Cl., Vol, xlvii, Abth. I, 1886; vol. liii, Abth. I. 
5 R. M. Johnston. Observations with respect to the nature and 
classification of the Tertiary rocks of Australia. Pap. & Proc. R. Soc. 
Tasmania, for 1887. Hobart, 1888, pp. 135-207. 
