DISTRIHUTION OF PTEROPUS 



525 



The inner margin of the nostrils projects, a preparation for the 

 tubular nostrils of Hdrpyia. The tail is a])sent. The pre- 

 molars are three and the molars two. The pyloric region of the 

 stomach is extended and twisted upon itself. Of tliis genus 

 there are nearly sixty species, extending from Madagascar to 

 Queensland. Thirty sjjecies inhabit tlie Australian, twenty th(^ 

 Oriental region. Madagascar has seven, and one species just 

 enters the I'alaearctic. The occurrence of this genus in India 

 and in Madagascar is one (jf those facts which favour the view 

 supported, on tliese and other grounds, by Dr. Dobson and Dr. 

 Blanford. that a connexion Ijetweeu India and Madagascar must 

 once have existed ; for these slow-flying creatures could hardly 

 be believed capal)le of traversing vast stretches of ocean by 

 their unaided efforts.^ 



Pteropvs is represented in the Etliiopian region by the allied 

 genus E'pomoiyhorus. Of tliis there are perhaps a dozen species. 



Fig. 257. — Flying Fox. Ptcropus poliocephalus. x 4. 



The teeth are reduced to two premolars in the upper jaw, 

 1 See Dobson, Ann. Nat. Hist. (5) xiv. 1884, p. 1.^)3. 



