CIIIROI'TERAX NOTES If) 



H. C. teplwus is not confined to Morocco, nor even to N. \\\ 

 Africa. As seen by the list of specimens referred l)y nic above to 

 this race, it also occurs in Nubia, Ashantee, the Gold Coast, and 

 Tortuguese Senegaml)ia. Tliis series of places gives, probably, a 

 fairly good idea of its true range, audit, at the same time, enables 

 us to iniderstand its origin and its present distribution. In discussing 

 these (|uestions, the following should be borne in mind: — First, 

 //. C. tepJirus is extremely closely related to the East African 

 H. c. caff'er, so closely, indeed, that there can l)e no reasona])le 

 doul)t that it is nothing but a northwestern ott'shoot of this latter; 

 second, if this is taken as granted, it can only have reached 

 Portuguese Senegambia and Western Morocct) in one of two 

 ways: either from Kordofan (the most northern point known of the 

 range of H. c. caffer } through the Nile Valley, along the 

 Mediterranean coast of Africa, to Morocco, down the Atlantic 

 coast to Senegambia and the Gold Coast; this route, in itself 

 highly improbable, is made practically unthinkable owing to the 

 tact that H. caffer is completely unknown in Egypt as well as 

 in the whole Mediterranean coast region of Africa; thus only a 

 second w^ay is left: from Kordofan H. c. caffer has spread north- 

 wards as far as Nubia, westwards through Bahr el Gazai, tlie Tsad 

 Sea Region and the Upper Niger Valley , to Ashantee and the 

 Gold Coast, further to Senegam])ia and northwards to Morocco. 

 l>y this explanation it is at once made clear, why there in the 

 western (Senegambia) and northwestern corner (Morocco) of Africa 

 occurs a race, H. C. tejjhrus, which lias nothing to do with the 

 geographically nearer H. c. guineensis or H. c. centralis, but, 

 on the contrary, is phylogenetically extremely closely connected 

 with the East African R. c. caffer; and it is also clear, why 

 there in the Guinean coast region (Ashantee, Gold Coast) occur 

 two races of this species, H. c. tephrus and guineensis which 

 })hylogenetically as well as in general appearance are the strongest 

 contrasts to each other: the former, namely , has come from east, 

 through the Niger Valley, the latter from the centre of Africa, 

 the Congo Valley. 



