( 1 °) 
The identity of many species of American and European Car¬ 
boniferous flora demands a careful investigation. Their floral 
habitats must have been far more intimately connected in the Car¬ 
boniferous Era, for it is unreasonable to suppose the isolated 
creation of identical species in such numerous instances upon the 
two continents. Not only are the botanical orders similar, but 
many of the genera and the species are identical. Such a homogene¬ 
ousness argues a community of origin and compels us to bridge the 
Atlantic for the Carboniferous ason. The uniformity of the early 
climate and topographical conditions, is insufficient to account 
for this general similarity, a similarity more and more patent 
under the generalization of the scholarly Lesquereux. 
The oceanic conditions of that era were highly favorable to this 
terrestrial proximity. The great mountain chains had scarcely a 
beginning at this era. All of the water that now forms the depths 
of the ocean then spread in shallows over much of the existing 
dry land. Great Dismal Swamps, some of almost inconceivable 
proportions, formed the insular face of the rising continents. As 
the bottom of the ocean is now made up of mountains, hills, val¬ 
leys and plains, much as the existing continents, so, before the 
formation of the ocean-bed by depression, many of the mountains 
and plateaus that are now covered with marine waters were doubt¬ 
less Carboniferous territory. These islands of the Carboniferous 
era were doubtless the highway for the dissemination of the Car¬ 
boniferous flora from continent to continent, all springing from one 
primordial habitat. These considerations seem to merit especial 
attention, and recall the language of Prof. Dana in his Geology, 
page 317. There, in speaking of fauna, he says : The Eastern 
border region is a repetition in many points, though on a smaller 
scale, of the more Western portion of the continent. The resem¬ 
blance of the fossils to the European according to Dawson implies 
a more direct connection through the Atlantic with the Eastern 
continent, than existed between Europe and the interior basin.” 
The meridional trend of the continents, mountains, and oceans 
is probably due to the forces of the axial revolution of the earth. 
This same force mapped the form of the Rhode Island coal-belt 
and the ocean border of New England. It is improbable that all 
the outcropping strata of the Rhode Island. Coal Measures synchro¬ 
nize, yet the question as to their relative age, whether belonging 
