362 NATURAL SCIENCE. May. . 



geologists to decide whether there is any evidence in favour of the 

 glaciation of this country which would account for the extermination 

 of Scorpions, supposing they had ever succeeded in establishing them- 

 selves there. For myself, I am disposed to think that none of the 

 recent groups of Scorpions have ever been represented in New 

 Zealand ; in which case it seems certain that the existing Scorpion 

 population of Australia made its way, like the Mammalia, into the 

 latter country after the isolation of New Zealand. 



So, too, with Madagascar. The absence of nearly all the large 

 Ethiopian forms from this island shows that the severance from the 

 mainland took place before the typical African genera had appeared 

 in the country. And the presence in Madagascar of genera of 

 Buthidae and Ischnuridse, peculiar but with marked African affinities, 

 points to the conclusion that, at the time of the connection with 

 Africa, species of these two families were the principal if not the sole 

 representatives of Scorpions in the Ethiopian Region. 



A discussion of the fauna of Madagascar naturally leads us to 

 inquire whether a study of the distribution of Scorpions affords any 

 support to the hypothesis of a former direct connection between this 

 island and the Oriental Region. But since there is no similarity between 

 the species of the two areas, we may dismiss the subject by saying 

 that the Scorpions do not furnish a particle of evidence that the union 

 has ever been more complete than it is at present. 



The absence of evidence in favour of Lemuria obviously suggests 

 an examination of the question of the existence of Antarctica, to 

 which many other groups bear witness. But here again all the 

 evidence is on the negative side. For, firstly, there is the absence of 

 Scorpions from New Zealand ; secondly, total dissimilarity between 

 the Scorpions of Madagascar and Australia, and of South Africa and 

 South America ; and, lastly, the almost complete want of resemblance 

 between the Scorpions of Australia and those of South America. The 

 one point of resemblance between these two countries is the presence in 

 Australia of a genus of the Bothriuridae, a family which is almost exclu- 

 sively confined to the Neotropical area. This case has been cited by 

 Mr. Forbes, in his interesting paper on the Chatham Islands, as an item 

 of evidence in favour of Antarctica. But, since furnishing Mr. Forbes 

 with the information that the Australian Cercophonius squama occurs 

 also in Chili, I have found grounds for doubting the truth of the 

 evidence upon which the information was based. If, however, it is so, 

 the fact of its being the same species that occurs on these two shores 

 of the South Pacific favours the view of artificial or fortuitous 

 introduction ; for apart from this one there is not a single species or 

 even genus which is common to the Old and New Worlds. But whether 

 or not the genus Cercophonius occurs in Australia and South America, 

 we still have to account for the presence in the former country of a 

 Scorpion belonging to a family which is typically South American. It 

 is possible, of course, that this may be explained, as Mr. Forbes 



