94 HUMMING-BIRDS. 



quarter of the world except Europe; and woodpeckers 

 are wanting only to New Holland. The peregrine 

 falcon, so renowned in a noble, but nearly forgotten, 

 sport, has its free range over the greater part of Europe, 

 America, and Greenland, and has been sent from the 

 distant continent of New Holland ; the short-eared 

 owl is common to Europe, Siberia, North America, and 

 the neighbourhood of Canton in China, and Pennant 

 mentions it as an inhabitant of the Falkland Islands ; 

 the common magpie extends over Europe, has been 

 sent from the Himmalayan range in India, and reaches 

 to the cold regions of North America ; while specimens 

 of the glossy ibis have reached this country from each 

 of the four quarters of the world, besides from many 

 of its far distant insulated lands. 



At variance, however, with this, we sometimes also 

 find the large continents possessing some peculiar 

 forms ; but, as if the economy of each great land could 

 not be properly supported without an organization 

 somewhat analogous, there is, in most instances, a re- 

 presentative, modified and adapted to the region it is 

 destined to inhabit. Thus, America has the South 

 American ostrich, or nandu, inhabiting the vast grassy 

 pampas of Paraguay, and extending nearly to the 

 Straits of Magellan ; India, and her great archipelago 

 of islands, particularly the Moluccas and Borneo, 

 possess the cassuary ; Africa, the true ostrich ; and 

 New Holland, the emeu. The Great Sahara, and 

 the deserts of Arabia, little fitted for the abode of any 

 animal creation, have their peculiarities in the coursers 



