V.] S1WALIK FAUNA. 2O; 



transitional elephants, but likewise one which may well have been 

 the ancestor of the species now inhabiting India. Eastwards these 

 transitional elephants and mastodons have been traced into Java, 

 Borneo, China, and Japan ; and, as stated in an earlier chapter, 

 there can be no doubt that the modern elephants were evolved in 

 this area. 



Although, as shown in the foregoing survey, the Siwalik fauna 

 differs in certain respects from that of Pikermi, Samos, Leberon, 

 etc., yet there can be no hesitation in regarding the whole lower 

 Pliocene fauna of Europe, North Africa, Asia Minor, and South 

 and East Asia as essentially one ; and consequently at this epoch 

 there was no possibility of distinguishing between the Palaearctic 

 and Oriental regions. Whence Ethiopian Africa had by this 

 time received the forerunners of its present higher mammalian 

 fauna, we have, unfortunately, no decisive evidence. Writing 

 some years ago, Dr Blanford 1 seems to suggest that the irruption 

 of the modem African fauna was anterior to the Pliocene. After 

 referring to certain peculiarities connected with the existing 

 mammalian fauna of India and the Malayan area, he observes that 

 " these cases of isolation probably indicate that the animals belong 

 to an older fauna, now partly replaced by newer types, and that 

 the older fauna was common to India and Africa. It is very 

 probable that these animals are descended from the ancient 

 tropical fauna of the early Tertiary times. But, so far as it is 

 possible to judge, the process of variation would have caused a 

 greater distinction between forms so widely separated and exposed 

 to such different conditions, if the period of isolation were great ; 

 and it is difficult to suppose that the lands inhabited by the 

 ancestors of the Simiidce, Lemuridce, Tragulida, and Manidce of 

 the Oriental and Ethiopian regions can have been separated prior 

 to the early part of the Miocene period." 



This is perfectly true so far as it goes, but since, as we have 

 seen, genera like Hippopotamus, Bos, Capra, Equus, and Elephas 

 are unknown previous to the Siwalik epoch, and some of them 

 at least were evolved at or about that time in the Indian area, it 

 seems necessary to assume the existence of a free land communi- 



1 Manual of Geology of India, ist ed. p. Ixviii. (1879). 



