tralia which we must equally assume to have existed in Permian
times? And, lastly, are there any peculiarities in the existing fauna
and flora of India, Africa and the intervening islands which would
lend support to the idea of a former connexion more direct than that
which now exists between Africa and South India and the Malay
peninsula? The speculation here put forward is no new one. It has long
been a subject of thought in the minds of some Indian and European
naturalists, among the former of whom I may mention my brother [Mr.
Blandford] and Dr. Stoliezka, their speculations being grounded on the
relationship and partial identity of the faunas and floras of past
times, not less than on that existing community of forms which has led
Mr. Andrew Murray, Mr. Searles, V. Wood, jun., and Professor Huxley to
infer the existence of a Miocene continent occupying a part of the
Indian Ocean. Indeed, all that I can pretend to aim at in this paper
is to endeavour to give some additional definition and extension to
the conception of its geological aspect.

"With regard to the geographical evidence, a glance at the map will
show that from the neighbourhood of the West Coast of India to that of
the Seychelles, Madagascar, and the Mauritius, extends a line of coral
atolls and banks, including Adas bank, the Laccadives, Maldives, the
Chagos group and the Saya de Mulha, all indicating the existence of a
submerged mountain range or ranges. The Seychelles, too, are mentioned
by Mr. Darwin as rising from an extensive and tolerably level bank
having a depth of between 30 and 40 fathoms; so that, although now
partly encircled by fringing reefs, they may be regarded as a virtual
extension of the same submerged axis. Further west the Cosmoledo and
Comoro Islands consist of atolls and islands surrounded by barrier
reefs; and these bring us pretty close to the present shores of Africa
and Madagascar. It seems at least probable that in this chain of
atolls, banks, and barrier reefs we have indicated the position of an
ancient mountain chain, which possibly formed the back-bone of a tract
of later Palaeozoic, Mesozoic, and early Tertiary land, being related
to it much as the Alpine and Himalayan system is to the
Europaeo-Asiatic continent, and the Rocky Mountains and Andes to the
two Americas. As it is desirable to designate this Mesozoic land by a
name, I would propose that of Indo-Oceana. [The name given to it by
Mr. Sclater, _viz._, Lemuria,