of their origin in a dry and intensely cold climate? I quite
agree with the views as to the Asiatic origin of the bulk of the Alpine
flora, while the dry state of the Siberian climate is certainly
indicated by the extremely feeble development of the glaciers during a
large part of the Glacial period. We know, however, that in Pliocene and
even in early Glacial times the atmospheric conditions must have been
very different in Siberia. A great slice of Central Asia was under
water, and numerous freshwater lakes covered the lowlands in the north,
so that the climate must have been damp though not cold enough for the
formation of extensive glaciers. Everything, in fact, seems to indicate
that the migration of the Asiatic Alpine flora took place at a very
early date--probably long before the Glacial period--either by the
Oriental or by the Arctic route _via_ North America, Greenland, and
Scandinavia. But would this not necessitate a survival of the Alpine
plants in the Alps themselves? That is the view which has already been
expressed with regard to the fauna, and the flora probably followed a
very similar course. This is by no means a novel theory, however, and
though unfortunately an untimely death has removed one of our very best
authorities on the Alpine flora before he had completed his life's work,
we have some indications in the earlier writings of John Ball that his
opinions on the origin of that flora did not coincide with those held by
the leading continental authors. To quote the words of this
distinguished botanist (p. 576): "Is it credible that in the short
interval since the close of the Glacial period hundreds of very distinct
species and several genera have been developed in the Alps, and--what is
no less hard to conceive--that several of these non-Arctic species and
genera should still more recently have been distributed at wide
intervals throughout a discontinuous chain some 1500 miles in length,
from the Pyrenees to the Eastern Carpathians? Nor would the difficulties
cease there. You would have left unexplained the fact that many of the
non-Arctic types which are present in the Alps are represented in the
mountains of distant regions, not by the same, but by allied species,
which must have descended from a common ancestor; that one species of
_Wulfenia_, for example, inhabits one small corner of the Alps, that
another is found in Northern Syria, while a third allied species has its
home in the Himalaya." Mr.