388 Evolution and Distribution of Fishes 



former marine continuity there), 3 on the coast from Lower 

 Cahfornia to Nicaragua, 3 from Mozambique to Mauritius, 

 2 from Mauritius eastward to the Philippines and southern 

 Chinese sea, 22 amid islands of the E. Indian Archipelago, 3 

 peculiar to the coast of Java, 2 in the Timor Friendly and 

 Fiji Islands, 2 from the "Red Sea through all the Indian 

 seas to Polynesia" and a few additional round the East 

 Indian Islands. 



Pomacentrus has 2 round the Cuban coast, i round 

 Jamaica, i along the Atlantic coast of tropical America, 

 I round Bahia, 2 from Lower California to central America, 

 I round Peru, i round the Sandwich Islands, 3 from 

 Mozambique to the Moluccas, 2 from the Isle de France 

 to the E. Indian Archipelago, Polynesia and the Australian 

 coast, 14 from the E. Indian Archipelago in general, and 

 the remainder round the E. Indian Islands. 



Heliastes includes 2 species round the Cuban coast, i 

 from the Caribbean sea, i common to the coasts of Bahia 

 and Lower California, as well as i peculiar to California, 

 I from the Chilean coasts, i from Madeira and the Medi- 

 terranean, I each from Mauritius, New Guinea and the 

 Moluccas seas, 2 from the East Indian Archipelago, and 

 I from the southern Chinese sea. 



If now, before dealing similarly with the Labridae and 

 Scaridae, an attempt be made to correlate the above into 

 a possible systematized line of advance, the following 

 might reasonably be set forth as exactly in line with like 

 distributions shown by many plant and animal groups. 

 Granted that during later Cretaceous or earliest Eocene 

 time migration of a few freshwater members of Centrar- 

 chidae or Percidae like Etheostoma took place into southern 

 marine waters of N. America. These, favored by the rich 

 coloration inherited from their freshwater ancestors, be- 

 came, through action of the law of Pentamorphogeny 

 (p. 13), increasingly adapted to algoid, coralloid, and rock 

 surroundings. 



They then seem to have spread nearly simultaneously 

 across the shallow coastal seas to California and Hawaii, 

 as well as round the N. Atlantis Bay to the east Brazilian 

 coast. Thereafter across the tropical northern edge of 



