CHAPTER XI 



DISTRIBUTION OF INSECTIVORES, BATS, 

 AND RODENTS 



Section I. — Introductory Remarks 



The three Orders, to which it is proposed to devote the 

 present chapter, contain the most difficult and least known 

 members of the whole class. They are very numerous, 

 especially the two latter groups, nearly all of small 

 size, and in most parts of the world have been very im- 

 perfectly studied. Within these last few years large 

 additions have been made to our knowledge of them, 

 especially in the case of the Rodents, and their proper 

 systematic arrangement is still a matter of much discus- 

 sion amongst naturalists. Under these circumstances, and 

 looking to the fact that these small mammals are of much 

 less general interest than their larger brethren, it is not 

 proposed to go very fully into the subject of their geo- 

 graphical distribution, but merely to point out some 

 of the leading and less controvertible facts known upon 

 this part of their history. We will commence with the 

 Insectivores, which are generally allowed to be in many 

 respects allied to the Carnivores, although they present 

 certain points in their structure which appear to show 

 a probability of their original descent from much lower 

 forms. 



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