26 INTRODUCTORY. [CHAP. 



Columbian region, the latter being equivalent to the Neotropical 

 of Sclater. 



Six years later, Dr Sclater 1 , who had by this time turned his 

 attention to the distribution of mammals, proposed to group the 

 regions he had previously named under three larger divisions, 

 making a fourth division for New Zealand and Polynesia. This 

 scheme is as follows, viz. : 



I. ARCTOG^EA. Palsearctic, Nearctic, Oriental, and Ethiopian 

 regions. 



II. DENDROG^A. Neotropical region. 



III. ANTARCTOG^EA. Australian region (exclusive of New 

 Zealand and Polynesia). 



IV. ORNITHOG^EA. New Zealand and Polynesian region. 



So far as mammals are concerned, this scheme was a great 

 advance on the first one, although the distinctness of Madagascar 

 was not recognised, while the Palasarctic and Nearctic regions 

 were still maintained. Most of the names for the major divisions 

 are, however, open to objection. 



In 1878 Dr Heilprin 2 , who does not employ these larger 

 groups, proposed, after a suggestion of Professor A. Newton, to 

 unite Dr Sclater's Palsearctic and Nearctic regions under the 

 common title of the Holarctic region ; separating, however, from 

 the former a "transitional" Mediterranean region, and from the 

 latter a similar Sonoran region. 



A further step was made in 1890 by Dr Blanford 8 , who pro- 

 posed the following scheme, viz. : 



I. Australian region. 



II. South American region. 



III. Arctogaan region ; this being divided into Malagasy, 

 Ethiopian, Oriental, Aquilonian ( Palaearctic and northern part 

 of Nearctic), and Medio-Columbian ( = Sonoran). 



Several other minor modifications have been suggested from 

 mammalian evidence, Dr Allen 4 in 1892 reviving the view that the 

 Oriental and Ethiopian regions should be united, under the name 

 of the Indo-African ; but the next most important memoir is that 



1 Appendix, No. 27. 2 Ibid., No. 17. 



3 Ibid., No. 8, p. 76. 4 Ibid., No. 2. 



