

DISTRIBUTION OF PTEROPUS 



525 



The inner margin of the nostrils projects, a preparation for the 

 tubular nostrils of Harpyia. The tail is absent. The pre- 

 molars are three and the molars two. The pyloric region of the 

 stomach is extended and twisted upon itself. Of this genus 

 there are nearly sixty species, extending from Madagascar to 

 Queensland. Thirty species inhabit the Australian, twenty the 

 Oriental region. Madagascar has seven, and one species just 

 enters the Palaearctic. The occurrence of this genus in India 

 and in Madagascar is one of those facts which favour the view 

 supported, on these and other grounds, by Dr. Dobson and Dr. 

 Blanford. that a connexion between India and Madagascar must 

 once have existed ; for these slow-flying creatures could hardly 

 be believed capable of traversing vast stretches of ocean by 

 their unaided efforts. 1 



Pteropus is represented in the Ethiopian region by the allied 

 genus Epomophorus. Of this there are perhaps a dozen species. 



FIG. 257. Flying Fox. Pteropus poliocephalus. x . 



The teeth are reduced to two premolars in the upper jaw, 



1 See Dobson, Ann. Nat. Hist. (5) xiv. 1884, p. 153. 



