the North Sea, the English Channel and the Irish Sea, would all be land areas with the exception of a long lake between Ireland and the Isle of Man, giving a river flowing to the south between Ireland and Cornwall.

It is also concluded that much of Central and Southern Europe was covered by a sea in which the Miocene beds of those areas were deposited and above which the present Alpine mountainous region displayed itself only by some low hills.

The Mediterranean Sea would then be two or three inland seas or lakes, with Greece united to Syria, Sicily united to Africa, and Sardinia and Corsica to France. No Straits of Gibraltar would have existed, for the South of Spain would have been joined to the North of Africa by a land area that would include the Balearic Islands, but it would be cut off from Europe by a sea or straits occupying the present valley of the Guadalquivir, and the North of Africa would have been separated from equatorial Africa by the Sahara Sea, which there is evidence for concluding continued until recent times.

In the east, the Aralo-Caspian area has been occupied by a great sea which there is reason to believe extended northwards to the Arctic Ocean; while the Baltic marine area would extend to the White Sea on the north-east and cover the lower lands of the Scandinavian peninsula to the west.

Far to the north, and curving westwards round the northern end of the Western Ocean, there would have been a land area joining the then narrow but lofty Scandinavian land by way of Spitzbergen to Greenland and the American continent. At the same time, probably all Northern Europe, from Denmark eastwards, would have been under water.

But after the Miocene period, the central and southern parts of Europe were elevated, and continued to rise until the previous low hills in a watery plain gradually became an extensive hilly region; and then a great series of mountain ranges on elevated land forming the Pyrenean, Alpine and Balkan region, which is now the distinguishing feature of Central Europe. A land communication was thus established between France, Germany and Asia, south of the Caspian Sea.

The North-Eastern Sea appears to have advanced westwards and southwards as far as the eastern parts of England, and the Great Western Sea we call the Atlantic, advanced eastwards to the present shores of Portugal, Spain and France, with an incursion between Ireland and Cornwall along the direction of the Bristol Channel, and another between England and France along the direction of the English Channel.

Still later, it is contended, this sea advanced sufficiently westwards to cover the East and the North of England, the Sonth of Scotland and a large part of Eastern and Central Ireland, while the West and North of Ireland remained connected with North Scotland and its islands on the west and north by continuous land. Subsequently a general elevation of Northern Europe laid bare an immense area of sea-bottom which established land communication between Western Europe and Asia, north of the Caspian Sea, and gave the configuration of land and water very much as it is at present, completed by the cutting through of the Straits of Dover and the Straits of Gibraltar.

AUTOCHTHONOUS SPECIES.

By far the greater number of the animals at present or recently living in Europe, and those now extinct but which lived in the European area during the Pleistocene or Prehistoric Quaternary period, have had for their original homes areas outside European boundaries. But there are a certain number of species which appear to have originated within the area of the European continental platform.

These autochthonous animals, as they have been called, appear to have spread in various directions from certain limited regions, or, it may be said, centres, which have been determined by the present extension and distribution of these species.

Three European areas of dispersion of autochthonous animals seem to have existed. The earliest has been called the Lusitanian region of dispersal, although it is much more extensive than Lusitania or Portugal, since it comprehends the whole of the present Iberian peninsula with the north-west of Africa, and an area that extended westwards into the Atlantic. Another was a south-eastern region, comprising the Balkan peninsula, and a third was the central mountainous area of the Alps and its extensions.

The most important of these was undoubtedly the southwestern or Lusitanian region, from which area species migrated northwards, north-eastwards and eastwards. The northward migration was favoured by the Atlantean extension of the continent which gave a direct land communication westwards of the Bay of Biscay for Lusitanian species to reach the SouthWest of England and Ireland. And thus it is that these areas contain both plants and animals not found in other parts of the British Islands or on the continent of Europe except in the south-west.

Perhaps the most notable animal of these species is the Gasteropod Geomalacus maculosus or spotted slug, which is in Kerry and Portugal.* The former direct land connection between Portugal and Ireland is also evidenced by the Arbutus unedo, or strawberry tree, and the Euphorbia hiberna, or Irish spurge, both species of South-West Europe; but in the north confined, the former to South-West Ireland, and the latter to that area and South-West England.

The mammals of Europe that may be regarded as having a Lusitanian origin are the rabbit (Lepus cuniculus), which is in Spain, France and the British Islands, and is fossil in the Pleistocene of Germany, and two moles of the genera Myogale and Talpa.

Of birds, there is one that is known in the British Islands, but only in the South-East of England, the Dartford warbler (Melizophilus undatus), that ranges to the extreme South-West of Europe, and another species of the same genus is in the Mediterranean Islands, and both may be regarded as of Lusitanian origin. Other Lusitanian birds are the pied wagtail, the bearded titmouse and some species of magpie and finch.

Of Reptilia may be noted the snake (Tropidonotus viperinus), and two or three species of lizards; while of Amphibia there are several toads, three newts, and the Salamandra chioglossa. There are, too, a number of species of terrestrial Mollusca, both of Helix and of slugs, including the before-mentioned Geomalacus. No less than ten species of spiders, several butterflies and beetles, and some other small invertebrates, are regarded as being of Lusitanian origin.

The south-east of Europe with its Balkan highlands was a considerable centre of dispersal of land Mollusca. One genus, Clausilia, has but a few species in the British Islands, and there is only one Clausilia in Spain, while in the south-eastern region there are about one hundred and thirty species.

Although probably the Alpine central region gave to Europe no new genus of Mammalia, there are several species that appear to have been there developed from more ancient stocks.

Of these the most noteworthy are perhaps the chamois (Rupicapra tragus) and the steinbock (Capra ibex). Both of these characteristic Alpine animals are doubtless species of genera of Asiatic origin which have been subjected to mountain conditions, and so have given the present Alpine forms. So also may be regarded the Alpine marmot (Arctomys marmotta),

*For a figure of this animal, see Scharff, European Animals, p. 89. .

the vole, Evotomys nageri, the Alpine shrew (Sorex alpinus), and the little dormouse (Muscardinus avellanarius), although the last named has spread over a large part of Europe, but not to Ireland.

This, however, can scarcely be said with respect to the genus Salamandra, which appears to be of Alpine origin, for although two species, S. maculosa and S. caucasia, have a somewhat extended range of habitat, it is centred on the Alpine region, while the third species, S. atra, is never found on the lower lands.

Species of land Mollusca of the genera Helix, Pomatias, Zonites, Acme, and Dandibardia appear to have had an Alpine origin, with some butterflies and grasshoppers.

SOUTH-EASTERN IMMIGRANTS.

The immigration of animals into the European area from Southern and Western Asia was by far the most important contribution to the fauna of Europe.

Europe itself, as has been stated, does not seem to have produced any genus of Mammalia, and the few that have entered Europe from Arctic lands are small and unimportant, though possessing considerable interest for the purposes of this enquiry; while the later immigration from North-Eastern Asia, or Siberia, important as it was undoubtedly, was much less considerable than the migration westwards into our continent of Southern Asiatic animals; for this much earlier faunal movement brought to Europe large quadrupeds and many birds and reptiles.

It was more especially an invasion of Miocene and Pliocene times; but the immigration has continued through the Pleistocene period down to historical times. Many of these Oriental immigrants have become extinct in the European area, but their bones are so abundant and well preserved in Pliocene and Pleistocene deposits that there is no difficulty in giving approximately complete lists of these animals, some of them well known as now living only in Asia and Africa.

The genus Elephas was represented in Europe by four species, while now there are only two species of elephants existing, the E. indicus of Asia and the E. africanus of Africa. Three of the four species ranged far north-westwards, and with land continuity found such a congenial habitat in what is now Britain that their bones are abundant in English Pleistocene deposits. In this district, the Thames Valley, two species were

so abundant that the teeth of no less than 100 elephants have been taken from the brick-earth of one brickfield at Ilford, Essex. It may also be noted here as interesting to London residents, that the bones of elephants have been found in many places in London itself, notably under Regent Street and Euston Square.

In the same Pleistocene beds are bones of rhinoceros and lion, and, more remarkable still, hippopotamus, which animal is now restricted to tropical African rivers. The excavation of the railway cutting at Kew Bridge revealed the bones of the following eight species of large mammals, all of Asiatic origin: Bison priscus, Bos longifrons, Cervus elaphus, Cervus tarandus, Elephas primigenius, Felis spelaa, Hippopotamus major and Rhinoceros tichorhinus.

In the deposits forming the floors of caverns, again, there are also the bones of the sabre-toothed tiger, Machærodus latidens, bear and, more numerous, hyæna.

The Pikermi deposits of Greece, which have recently been examined, give a remarkable assemblage of bones of animals, most probably of Asiatic and East African origin, amongst which are found the giraffe and antelopes and several species of monkeys.

Though the camel is not generally known as a living European animal, it still exists in one small area in South-West Spain, though probably introduced by man, but the fossil remains of the genus Camelus have been found in Roumania and South Russia. Similarly we find in one corner of the Spanish peninsula, Gibraltar, the so-called Barbary ape (Macaus innus).

That splendid animal, the Irish elk (Megaceros hibernica), which has left its bones and magnificent antlers under the Irish bogs as well as in the Isle of Man, England, Scotland, France, Denmark, Germany, Austria, Italy, and Russia, was probably specifically, as it undoubtedly was generically, Asiatic, though the species may possibly have been developed in Europe.

Of the more commonly known mammalia of Europe which have had a southern or western Asiatic origin may be noted the following: The badger, cat, common hare, fallow deer, goat, horse, pig, red deer, roebuck, and the sheep.

Many of our birds, too, have had a southern Asiatic origin especially those having a more resplendent plumage.

The peacock (Pavo cristatus), well known in Judea in Solomon's time, was in Greece after Alexander's Asiatic exploits