XXXV111 INTRODUCTION. 



the geuus Hippopotamus, extinct in England, in Europe, 

 and in Asia,"* should continue to be represented in Africa 

 and in none of the remoter continents of the earth ? 

 Africa also having its Hysena, its Elephant, its Rhino- 

 ceroses, and its great feline Carnivores. The discovery 

 of extinct species of Camelopardalis in both Europe and 

 Asia, of which genus the sole existing representative is 

 now, like the Hippopotamus, confined to Africa, adds 

 to the propriety of regarding the three continuous con- 

 tinental divisions of the Old World as forming, in respect 

 to the geographical distribution of pliocene, post-pliocene 

 and recent Mammalian genera, one great natural province. 

 The only large Edentate animal (Pangolin gigantesque, 

 Cuvier, MacrotJierium, Lartet) hitherto found in the ter- 

 tiary deposits of Europe, but in those of an earlier period 

 (older pliocene or miocene) than the deposits to whose 

 Mammalian Fossils the present comparison more imme- 

 diately refers, manifests its nearest affinities to the genus 

 Manis, which is exclusively Asiatic and African. 



Extending our comparison between the existing and 

 the latest of the extinct series of Mammalia to the con- 

 tinent of South America, it may first be remarked, that 

 with the exception of some of the carnivorous and Cer- 

 vine species, no representatives of the above-cited Mam- 

 malian genera of the Old World of the geographer have 

 yet been found in South America. Buffon -f- long since 

 enunciated a similar generalization with regard to the 

 existing species and genera of Mammalia ; it is almost 



* Marsden, in his ' History of Sumatra,' mentions a species of Hippopotamus 

 as still existing in the Sunda Isles ; but this has much need of confirmation : the 

 fossil sub-genus of Hippopotamus (Hexaprotodon of Cautley and Falconer) gives 

 a new stimulus, however, to the inquiry after the Hippopotamus or Succatyro 

 of the Indian Archipelago. 



t Cited by Lyell in the 'Principles of Geology, 1 1837, vol. iii. p. 27. 



