282 CONTRASTS AND ANALOGUES. 



same order, the Antelopes, many of which attain the dimensions of 

 the Horse, belong exclusively to the Eastern Hemisphere. The genus 

 Camel, represented in Asia by the Bactrian Camel, in Africa by the 

 Dromedary, is but weakly typified in South America by the Lama, 

 the Vicuna, and the Alpaca, not inelegant in form, but of a markedly 

 inferior stature. And what equality is there between the lordly 

 Tiger of the rank Indian jungles, and the sleek, stealthy Jaguar of 

 the American wilderness ? Or who will venture to compare the 

 so-called " Lion of America," the Puma or Cougouar, with the regal 

 quadruped which makes the hot Libyan wastes re-echo with his 

 terrible roar ? 



Among the Birds, the Phenicoptera, with its disproportionate legs 

 and neck, distributed over all the ancient continent below 40 of 

 latitude, and the Ostrich, properly so called, are much superior in 

 dimensions to their analogues on the other side of the Atlantic, the 

 American Flamingo and the Nandou. So do the Eagles and Vultures 

 of Europe, Asia, arid Africa prevail in numbers and force over those 

 of the New World. And the ancient continent can likewise claim 

 as its own the gigantic Epiornis, the wonderful " Roc Bird" of the 

 well-known Oriental legend, whose petrified eggs and some of whose 

 fossil bones have been discovered in Madagascar. It is true, how- 

 ever, that the greatest of living Raptores, the Condor, inhabits exclu- 

 sively the Cordillera of the Andes : 



" Stands solitary, stands immovable 

 Upon some highest cliff, and rolls his eye, 

 Clear, constant, unobservant, unabashed, 

 In the cold light, above the dews of morn." ( W. S. Landor.) 



But the balance is re-established by the Erpetological and Ento- 

 mological Fauna of the New World, which can oppose its huge Boas, 

 its Caimans and Pythons, to the Crocodiles and Gavials of Africa and 

 Asia ; its Crotali and Trigonocephali to the Najas of India, the 

 Echidnas of the Cape, and the Cerastes of Egypt and the Sahara ; 

 while the Bull Frog of the United States and the Pipa of Guiana are 

 only found on the banks of the vast lonesome swamps of the new 



