CHAPTER XII 



DISTRIBUTION OF HYRAXES, ELEPHANTS, 

 AND UNGULATES 



Section I. — Distribution of Hyraxes 



The Hyraxes and Elephants are nowadays often annexed 

 to the Ungulates, and arranged only as Sub-orders of that 

 great Order, to some members of which they have been 

 shown to be more or less allied by forms of life now 

 extinct. But as, in the present case, we are dealing only 

 with existing mammals, it seems better to give to these 

 two groups their full rank as " Orders," which they have 

 an abundance of special characters to justify. The 

 Hyraxes, of which, taking Mr. Thomas's recently published 

 account 1 as our guide, about fourteen species belonging 

 to the single genus Hyrax are more or less accurately 

 known, may be regarded as a characteristic form of the 

 Ethiopian Region. As shown by Mr. Thomas's map (op. 

 cit. p. 58) they are distributed all round the coast of 

 Africa from Senegal through the Cape to Upper Egypt, 

 and also in many places, where they have been searched 

 for, in the interior. Beyond the African continent they 

 extend through Arabia into the borders of Palestine, where 

 the celebrated " coney " of the Scriptures (Hyrax syriacus) 



1 "On the species of the Hyracoidea,'" by 0. Thomas, P. Z. S. 1892, 



p. 50. 



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