The Geographical Distribution of Animals: With a Study of the Relations of Living and Extinct Faunas as Elucidating the Past Changes of the Earth's Surface, 2. köideMacmillan and Company, 1876 - 503 pages |
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Page 28
... fact of its zoological and geographical diversity , as well as its vast superiority over every other sub- region in the number and variety of its animal forms . The reptiles , fishes , mollusca , and insects of this sub - region have ...
... fact of its zoological and geographical diversity , as well as its vast superiority over every other sub- region in the number and variety of its animal forms . The reptiles , fishes , mollusca , and insects of this sub - region have ...
Page 33
... facts exactly harmonize with the theory , that they have been peopled by rare accidental immigrations at very remote intervals . The only peculiar genera consist of birds and lizards , which must therefore have been the earliest ...
... facts exactly harmonize with the theory , that they have been peopled by rare accidental immigrations at very remote intervals . The only peculiar genera consist of birds and lizards , which must therefore have been the earliest ...
Page 35
... facts . We are taught that tropical land - birds , unless blown out of their usual course by storms , rarely or never venture out to sea , or if they do so , can seldom pass safely over a distance of 500 miles . The immigrants to the ...
... facts . We are taught that tropical land - birds , unless blown out of their usual course by storms , rarely or never venture out to sea , or if they do so , can seldom pass safely over a distance of 500 miles . The immigrants to the ...
Page 40
... fact that so many of the species belong to genera which are wholly Neotropical , and that the specially South American families of Icterida , Tyrannidæ , Den- drocolaptidæ , Pteroptochida , Trochilidæ , and Conuridæ , should supply more ...
... fact that so many of the species belong to genera which are wholly Neotropical , and that the specially South American families of Icterida , Tyrannidæ , Den- drocolaptidæ , Pteroptochida , Trochilidæ , and Conuridæ , should supply more ...
Page 47
... fact in the case of the Carabidæ , and with the butterflies it is not more difficult . The great mass of Neotropical butterflies are forest species , and have been de- veloped for countless ages in a forest - clad tropical country . The ...
... fact in the case of the Carabidæ , and with the butterflies it is not more difficult . The great mass of Neotropical butterflies are forest species , and have been de- veloped for countless ages in a forest - clad tropical country . The ...
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Common terms and phrases
9 sp abundant affinities allied animals Antilles Arctic Asia AUSTRALIAN NEOTROPICAL NEARCTIC Australian region belong birds Bolivia Borneo Brazil California Canada Celebes Central America Ceylon characteristic Chili coast Columbia confined Costa Rica Cuba DISTRIBUTION.-The East Eastern Ecuador Eocene ETHIOPIAN ORIENTAL AUSTRALIAN Ethiopian region extending extinct fauna forests Fresh-water fishes genera genus globe Guatemala Guiana Guinea Hayti Himalayas India inhabits insects Jamaica Japan Java Madagascar Malay Mammalia Mexico Miocene Moluccas NEARCTIC PALEARCTIC ETHIOPIAN Nearctic region NEOTROPICAL NEARCTIC PALEARCTIC NEOTROPICAL NEARCTIC SUB-REGIONS Neotropical region northern number of species occur Ocean Old World ORIENTAL AUSTRALIAN NEOTROPICAL ORIENTAL AUSTRALIAN SUB-REGIONS Oriental region ORIENTAL SUB-REGIONS Pacific PALEARCTIC ETHIOPIAN ORIENTAL PALEARCTIC ETHIOPIAN SUB-REGIONS Palearctic region Paraguay Patagonia peculiar genera Peru Plata Pliocene possesses range remarkable seas single species South America South Europe southern Sub-family Sumatra Tasmania Tropical America Tropical and South tropical regions Tropical South America Venezuela West Africa West Indian Islands Zealand
Popular passages
Page 346 - ... so completely intermediate between the anserine birds on the one side, and the storks and herons on the other, that it can be ranged with neither of these groups, but must stand as the type of a division by itself.
Page 536 - ... catalogued on a uniform plan, and with a uniform nomenclature, a thoroughly satisfactory account of the Geographical Distribution of Animals will not be possible.
Page 5 - Richness combined with isolation is the predominant feature of Neotropical zoology, and no other region can approach it in the number of . its peculiar family and generic types.
Page 203 - ... elk. Erasmus Stella describes the elk as existing in Prussia in the early part of the sixteenth century (' De Borussiae antiquitatibus,' in Novus Orbis regionum ac insularum veteribus incognitarum (Paris, 1532), p. 507 [wrongly numbered 497] sq.) The elk or moose deer still ranges over the whole of Northern Europe and Asia as far south as East Prussia, the Caucasus, and North China. It was once common in the forests of Germany and France, and is still found in some parts of Norway and Sweden,...
Page 174 - Condylura (1 species), the star-nosed mole, inhabits Eastern North America from Nova Scotia to Pennsylvania; Scapanus (2 species) ranges across from New York to St.
Page 329 - It is a large, brown, long-legged, weakly-formed and loosely-crested bird, having such anomalies of structure that it is impossible to class it along with any other family. It is one of those survivors, which tell us of extinct groups, of whose past existence we should otherwise, perhaps, remain for ever ignorant.
Page 326 - ... Philippines (where indeed they were first discovered by Europeans), Labuan, and even the Nicobars — though none is known from the intervening islands of Borneo, Java or Sumatra. Within what may be deemed their proper area they are found, says AR Wallace (Ceogr. Distr. Anitnals, ii. 341), " on the smallest islands and sandbanks, and can evidently pass over a few miles of sea with ease.
Page 354 - ... and perhaps the main one — in bringing about the extinction of many of the larger species of these wingless birds. The wide distribution of the Struthiones may, as we have already suggested (VoL I., p. 287.), be best explained, by supposing them to represent a very ancient type of bird, developed at a time when the more specialized carnivorous mammalia had not come into existence, and preserved only in those areas which were long free from the incursions of such dangerous enemies.
Page 370 - ... before we reach the Arctic Circle — we cannot expect the two Northern regions to exhibit any great variety or peculiarity. Yet in their warmer portions they are tolerably rich; for, of the 25 families of snakes, 6 are found in the Nearctic region, 10 in the...
Page 537 - Some of these coincident variations have been alluded to in various parts of this work, but they have never been systematically investigated. They constitute an unworked mine of wealth for the enterprising ' explorer ; and they may not improbably lead to the discovery of some of the hidden laws (supplementary to Natural Selection), which seem to be required, in order to account for many of the external characteristics of animals.