Irish Spurge (_Euphorbia hiberna_). In Ireland along the south and west coasts. In England it is confined to Devonshire. On the Continent it occurs only in the south-west. [Illustration: _Photo, J. St. J. Phillips._ Among the Arbutus, Cloonee Lakes.] [Illustration: _Photo, Welch, Belfast._ Arbutus Islands, Killarney.] Going for a moment further north, we find in Connemara, and there only, a group of three kinds of Heath with the same peculiar distribution:-- [Illustration: _Photo, Welch, Belfast._ The Irish Spurge.] St. Dabeoc's Heath (_Dabeocia polifolia_). In Ireland in Connemara. Unknown in England. On the Continent confined to the south-west. Mediterranean Heath (_Erica mediterranea_). In Ireland in Connemara. Unknown in England. On the Continent confined to the south-west. Mackay's Heath (_E. Mackaiana_). In Ireland in Connemara. Unknown in England. On the Continent in Spain only. Nor is it the plants alone that exhibit the peculiar relation existing between the Natural History of Ireland and of the Pyrenean region. Among the animals the same features may be observed, the most striking instance being the peculiar Kerry Slug (_Geomalacus maculosus_), which is abundant in many parts of the extreme south-west of Ireland, and is elsewhere found only in Portugal. [Illustration: _Drawing, Dr. R. F. Scharff._ The Kerry Slug.] Mixed with these southern forms in the West of Ireland we find another group of still stranger affinities. In pools and lakes from Kerry to Donegal grows the curious Pipe-wort (_Eriocaulon septangulare_). It may be also found in the Island of Skye, in the West of Scotland, but nowhere else in Europe; to see it again we must go to the northern regions of North America, where it flourishes under conditions much more rigorous than those which obtain in its mild Irish home. The deliciously fragrant orchid, _Spiranthes Romanzoviana_, grows in the counties of Cork, Armagh, Antrim, and Londonderry; elsewhere only in sub-arctic America and the portion of Asia which most nearly approaches the Alaskan shores. The "Blue-eyed Grass" of Canada (_Sisyrinchium angustifolium_) is likewise confined to the West of Ireland and to North America; and further instances might be quoted. In the animal kingdom, too, parallel cases have been noted, the most interesting being the discovery of no less than three American species of fresh-water sponge, which are unknown in the rest of Europe. To account for the presence of this American group naturalists are driven, as in the case of the southern species, to the conclusion that these represent one of the very oldest components of our existing fauna and flora, and point to a period when the edge of Europe was prolonged far to the north-west, forming a continuous land area, presumably by way of Iceland and Greenland, to America. And here on the wild western coast of Ireland these last inhabitants of the lost lands of Europe still survive.