EVIDENCE FROM DISTRIBUTION 129 



space from which it is absent. Two or three ex- 

 amples, of which history affords the solution, may 

 be cited. At the present time the family of the 

 tapirs is found in the Oriental region and in South 

 America, with almost half the circumference of the 

 earth between them. In the latter part of the Ter- 

 tiary period the tapirs ranged all over the northern 

 hemisphere, but became extinct in Europe before 

 the Pleistocene; at the close of the latter epoch they 

 vanished from eastern Asia and from North America, 

 persisting in southern Asia and in Central and South 

 America to the present day. We have no means of 

 telling why they became extinct in the areas from 

 which they vanished, but the significant fact remains 

 that the vast stretch of land between their modern 

 homes was formerly covered by them. According 

 to the doctrine of special creation this fact explains 

 nothing, because the American species are different 

 from the Asiatic, but this is the almost inevitable 

 result, if evolution be true. The extremes of such a 

 wide ranging genus would, in the great majority of 

 cases, diverge to such an extent that it would be 

 necessary to refer them to distinct species. 



A second case is very similar. The camel family is 

 divided into two well-defined genera, the true camels, 

 which are native to Asia, and the guanacos, llamas, 

 etc., of South America. This family, during much 

 the longest part of its history, was exclusively North 

 American in distribution, but in the Pliocene epoch 

 true camels had appeared in India and llamas had 



