CHAPTER XI. 



THE ETHIOPIAN REGION. 



This is one of the best defined of the great zoological regions, 

 consisting of tropical and South Africa, to which must be added 

 tropical Arabia, Madagascar, and a few other islands, all popu- 

 larly known as African. Some naturalists would extend the 

 region northwards to the Atlas Mountains and include the whole 

 of the Sahara ; but the animal life of the northern part of that 

 great desert seems more akin to the Palsearctic fauna of North 

 Africa. The Sahara is really a debatable land which has been 

 peopled from both regions; and until we know more of the natural 

 history of the great plateaus which rise like islands in the waste 

 of sand, it will be safer to make the provisional boundary line at 

 or near the tropic, thus giving the northern half to the Palsearctic, 

 the southern to the Ethiopian region. The same line may be 

 continued across Arabia 



With our present imperfect knowledge of the interior of 

 Africa, only three great continental sub-regions can be well de- 

 fined. The open pasture lands of interior tropical Africa are 

 wonderfully uniform in their productions ; a great number of 

 species ranging from Senegal to Abyssinia and thence to the 

 Zambesi, while almost all the commoner African genera extend 

 over the whole of this area. Almost all this extensive tract of 

 country is a moderately elevated plateau, with a hot and dry 

 climate, and characterised by a grassy vegetation interspersed 

 with patches of forest. This forms our first or East African 

 sub-region. The whole of the west coast from the south side of 

 the Gambia Paver to about 10° or 12° south latitude, is a very 



