92 LIFE AND OKGANISATION. 



surface, recorded by geology ; those mighty interchanges 

 of land and ocean, by which continents have been raised or 

 submerged, climates changed, and all living nature brought 

 into subjection to this elemental strife. 



Australia is generally quoted as the most striking example 

 of such local limitation of forms, both in animal and vege- 

 table life. This strange Continent scarcely known a cen- 

 tury ago, now the flourishing seat of British empire in the 

 Southern hemisphere stood, when discovered, in a sort of 

 solitary contradiction to the r.est of the known world. Of 

 4,100 species, forming its earliest recorded Flora, only 106 

 were found elsewhere. The Eucalyptus and leafless Acacias, in 

 their numerous species, inflicted a sombre hue on its scenery, 

 while the marsupial animals, with other strange configurations 

 of animal life, gave an eccentric and paradoxical character 

 to the Fauna of this region. The Galapagos Isles, so well 

 described by Darwin, furnish another example even more 

 striking from its limitation. These isles (volcanic in origin), 

 though but 600 miles from the South American coast, yet 

 form a distinct province both in their Flora and Fauna ; with 

 scarcely a single organic production which is not aboriginal 

 in species, and unknown elsewhere. South America itself is 

 the peculiar domicile of the very singular order of Edentata, 

 or toothless animals, which are here found both living and 

 fossil ; while north of Mexico they are unknown except in 

 the fossil state. The Sloth, that strange and grotesque 

 member of this order, and the Armadillos, are found in 

 America only. New Guinea, with some island groups to the 

 east, forms a particular zoological province ; singular from 

 being destitute, with one exception, of all warm-blooded 

 quadrupeds. The Elephant, Ehinoceros, Giraffe, Hippo- 

 potamus, &c., are limited now to certain portions of the old 

 world, though their fossil remains are much more widely 

 diffused. The marine animals, much more vaguely of course, 



