CHAPTER VI. 



THE ORIENTAL MIGRATION. 



THE Oriental migration is closely related to the 

 Siberian. Both have originated within the Asiatic 

 continent, and in many respects a strict line cannot 

 be drawn between them. There can be no doubt 

 that some of the species which we regard as Siberian 

 migrants had their original home in more southern 

 latitudes, and thus may have formed part of the 

 older Oriental migration. The home of that migra- 

 tion I take to be Central and Southern Asia, that is 

 to say, everything south of the Altai Mountains and 

 the Caucasus. Its members have reached Europe 

 across an old land-connection which united Turkey, 

 Greece, and Syria, while the Siberian animals in- 

 vaded our continent to the north of the Caspian and 

 Caucasus. 



The Siberian immigrants into Europe on the whole 

 are not very numerous, but it is different with those 

 from the more southern parts of the Asiatic con- 

 tinent. The members of the Oriental migration 

 form a very large percentage of the European fauna. 

 No other migration has affected our continent so 

 powerfully, because it continued uninterruptedly for 



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