394 A ZOOGEOGRAPHIC SCHEME FOR THE MID-PACIFIC, 



The Continental Faunas. 



Before we can profitably discuss the insular region of the mid- 

 Pacific, we must grasp the main features of the continental area 

 which lies to the west of it. 



Broadly, the physical features of the latter are as follows : — The 

 eastern coast of Australia presents a great and pretty uniform 

 curve. An arc, which though diverging as it trends southward, 

 somewhat corresponds to that curve, appears in broken segments 

 in south-east New Guinea, the Louisiades, New Caledonia and 

 New Zealand. ••' Beyond that again an outermost arc is formed 

 by the Solomons and Fiji. 



In the Central Pacific the curves are reversed. Towards Aus- 

 tralia is presented the convexity of a long chain of archipelagoes 

 which runs from the Marshalls, through the Gilberts, Ellice, 

 Samoa and the Hervey to the Austral Islands, and which, as my 

 reviewer in Nature suggests, is "perhaps represented still further 

 to the south-east by the great Patagonian platform that projects 

 north-westwai'ds from the coast of South America."! This chain 

 I call the Marshall- Austral chain. 



To understand the source of the fauna of Funafuti, it will Ije 

 necessary to trace the relations of the various continental faunas 

 which lie nearest. 



A large proportion of the Marine Invertebrates of Funafuti 

 can be followed westwards through New Guinea, the Malay 

 Archipelago, the Andamans, Ceylon, and Mauritius to the Red 

 Sea. This tract is generally known as the Indo-Pacific or Oriental 

 Region. Some writers have divided this region by a line which, 

 running between Bali and Lombok, is called " Wallace's Line," 

 after its describer. This division has occasioned much dispute 



* Koto has remarked how "New Zealand and New Caledonia conform 

 to the outcurve of Eastern Australia." (Journ. Coll. Sci. Univ. Tokyo, 

 xi. Pt. ii. 1899, p. 114). 



t Nature, 7th July, 1898, p. 221. 



