EMIGRATION AND EVOIUTION. 131 



obviously allied to forms on the nearest mainland. 

 Distance is only of minor importance ; for some of 

 the most interesting island avifaimas in the world 

 are located close to the continent which has 

 fortuitously given them birth ; whilst many remote 

 islands favourably situated on routes of migration 

 are remarkable for their paucity of endemic species. 

 The Galapagos Islands, for instance, are situated 

 on the Equator in the Pacific Ocean, about 600 

 miles from the West Coast of South America, in a 

 calm region remarkable for the absence of gales. 

 They are far removed from any present highway of 

 migration, and no evidence exists to show any indi- 

 cations of an ancient route ever having crossed 

 them. No less than thirty-eight out of the fifty- 

 seven species of birds hitherto obtained on these 

 islands are absolutely endemic. All the land birds 

 (thirty-one in number) are peculiar except one 

 species, the wide-ranging Rice Bird {Dolichonyx 

 oryzivora)', and more than half of these thirty 

 species present such divergence of characters as to 

 be classed in distinct genera. The Bermudas, on 

 the other hand, lying 700 miles from the East Coast 

 of North America, and 100 miles further from 

 continental land than the Galapagos, are near one 

 of the greatest routes of migration in the world, 

 situated in an area where equinoctial storms of 

 great violence and persistency prevail. More than 

 180 species of birds have been recorded from them, 

 yet not one of these is endemic, and of the ten 

 species that are resident, all are common on the 



