Geographical Distribution. 241 



wool or hair of moving quadrupeds, and so to further 

 their own dissemination. But, as we have just seen, 

 there are no quadrupeds in the islands to meet 

 these beautiful adaptations on the part of the plants ; 

 so that special creationists must resort to the almost 

 impious supposition that in these cases the Deity has 

 only carried out half his plan, in that while he made 

 an elaborate provision for these uniquely created 

 species of plants, which depended for its efficiency on 

 the presence of quadrupeds, he nevertheless neglected 

 to place any quadrupeds on the islands where he had 

 placed the plants. Such one-sided attempts at adap- 

 tation surely resolve the thesis of special creation to a 

 rediictio ad absiirduni ; and hence the only reasonable 

 interpretation of them is, that while the seeds of allied 

 or ancestral plants were able to float to the islands, no 

 quadrupeds were ever able over so great a distance to 

 swim. 



Although much more evidence might still be given 

 under the head of geographical distribution, I must 

 now close with a brief summary of the main points 

 that have been adduced. 



After certain preliminary considerations, I began 

 by noticing that the theory of evolution has a much 

 more intelligible account to give than has its rival of 

 the facts of discontinuous distribution — the Alpine 

 flora, for instance, being allied to the Arctic, not 

 because the same species were separately created in 

 both places, but because during the glacial period 

 these species extended all over Europe, and were 

 left behind on the Alps as the Arctic flora receded 

 northwards— which was sufficiently long ago to ex- 



