104 THE WANDERINGS OF ANIMALS [OH. 



of this line (between Borneo and Celebes, Java and 

 Lombok), and their absence from North America, 

 point them out as the most recently evolved group of 

 poisonous snakes. The original centre of them all 

 seems to have been Eastern Asia, and the dispersal 

 had taken place with the Miocene. 



BIRDS. 



" Ratitae ' are not a natural group ; they are 

 related to each other only in so far as that they are 

 the flightless descendants of that stock of terrestrial 

 birds which has given rise to the Tinamoos, Cranes 

 and Fowls. Since the early Tertiary, Ratitae have 

 arisen at different times and in various countries, 

 independently of each other. Many are now extinct. 

 Rhea lives in South America. Struthio, the ostrich, 

 now in Africa and Arabia ; known from Pliocene 

 of Samos, North -West India and Northern Asia. 

 Cassowaries chiefly in Papuasia, emus in Australia. 

 Aepyornis in Madagascar, where extinguished possibly 

 by man ; the l Ruk' of the fable. New Zealand and 

 Stewart Island have the kiwis (Apteryx), and there 

 was an abundance of moas (Dinornis), some of them 

 gigantic, extinguished by the Maoris. 



Penguins are essentially antarctic, also on the 

 south coasts of New Zealand, Australia, the Cape and 

 South America, on the west coast of which they 



