Creations on each Continent. 21 



uniformity of some families renders the difference of the 

 types in various parts of the world less striking, they are 

 none the less real. The Carnivora of tropical Asia are not 

 the same as those of tropical Africa, or those of tropical 

 America. Their birds and reptiles present similar differ- 

 ences. The want of an ostrich in Asia, when we have one, 

 the largest of the family, in Africa, and two distinct species in 

 Southern America, and two cassowaries, one in New Holland, 

 and another in the Sunda Islands, shews this constant 

 process of analogous or representative species repeated over 

 different parts of the world to be the principle regulating the 

 distribution of animals, and the fact that these analogous 

 species are different, again, cannot be reconciled to the idea 

 of a common origin, as each type is peculiar to the country 

 where it is now found. These differences are more striking 

 in tropical regions than anywhere else. The rhinoceros of 

 the Sunda Islands differs from those of Africa, and there is 

 none in America. The elephant of Asia differs from that of 

 Africa, and there is none in America. One tapir is found in 

 the Sunda Islands, there is none in Africa, but we find 

 one in South America, &c. Everywhere special adaptation, 

 particular forms in each continent, an omission of some allied 

 type here, when in the next group it occurs all over the zone. 

 As we ascend into the temperate zone, we find, however, 

 the similarity greatly increased. The difference between the 

 species of the same family in temperate Asia, temperate 

 Europe, and temperate America is much less than between 

 the corresponding animals of the tropical zone, and no doubt 

 it is to this great assemblage of more uniform animals, living 

 originally within the main seat of human civilization, that we 

 must ascribe the idea of their common origin, which has so 

 long prevailed and been so serious an obstacle to a real in- 

 sight into these natural phenomena. What, indeed, could be 

 more natural for man, when for the first time reflecting upon 

 nature around him, — when seeing, as far as he could extend 

 his investigations, all things alike, — than to imagine that every 

 thing arose from a common centre, and spread with him ov^r 

 the world, as it has been the fate of the white race, and of 

 that only, to extend all over the globe, and that, influenced 



