52 ISLAND LIFE part i 



two great tropical regions of the Eastern Hemisphere (the 

 Ethiopian and the Oriental) combined. 



As an additional indication of the distinctness and 

 isolation of the Neotropical region from all others, and 

 especially from the whole Eastern Hemisphere, we must 

 say something of the otherwise widely distributed groups 

 which are absent. Among mammalia we have first the 

 order Insectivora, entirely absent from South America, 

 though a few species are found in Central America and 

 the West Indies ; the Viverrida^ or civet family is wholly 

 wanting, as are every form of sheeiD, oxen, or antelopes ; 

 while the swine, the elephants, and the rhinoceroses of the old 

 world are represented by the diminutive peccaries and tapirs. 



Among birds we have to notice the absence of tits, true 

 flycatchers, shrikes, sunbirds, starlings, larks (except a soli- 

 tary species in the Andes), rollers, bee-eaters, and pheasants, 

 while warblers are very scarce, and the almost cosmopolitan 

 wagtails are represented by a single species of pipit. 



We must also notice the preponderance of low or archaic 

 types among the animals of South America. Edentates, 

 marsuj^ials, and rodents form the majority of the terrestrial 

 mammalia ; while such higher groups as the carnivora and 

 hoofed animals are exceedingly deficient. Among birds a low 

 type of Passeres, characterised by the absence of the singing 

 muscles, is excessively prevalent, the enormous grou23s of 

 the ant-thrushes, tyrants, tree-creepers, manakins, and 

 chatterers belonging to it. The Picarise (a lower group) also 

 prevail to a far greater extent than in any other regions, 

 both in variety of forms and number of species ; and the 

 chief representatives of the gallinaceous birds — the curassows 

 and tinamous, are believed to be allied, the former to the 

 brush-turkeys of Australia, the latter (very remotely) to 

 the ostriches, two of the least developed types of birds. 



Whether, therefore, we consider its richness in peculiar 

 forms of animal life, its enormous variety of species, its 

 numerous deficiencies as compared with other parts of the 

 world, or the j^revalence of a low type of organisation 

 among its higher animals, the Neotropical region stands 

 out as undoubtedly the most remarkable of the great 

 zoological divisions of the earth. 



In reptiles, amphibia, fresh-water fishes, and insects, 



