Element in the Fauna of India. 279 



accurate as Jonlon's * ^lanimal.s' ami ' IJirtls ' generally are in 

 questions of distrilnition, some geographical expre-ssions arc 

 very loosely used. Thus when Jcrdon u$es the term Central 

 Inclia, he soujetimes means the country near Nsigpur, some- 

 times the region known jnilitieally as ('entral India, coiii- 

 prisiiig Ivajpiitana, Indore, and (iwalior, s<»nietinies ('liutia 

 Xagpiir, a tract of country with a very dillerent fauna. 



1 regret to say that 1 have not now time to give even the 

 detiiils 1 have accumulated on the subject ; all 1 can do is to 

 attempt a meagre criticism of Mr. Wallace's lists of the 

 fauna of India ; but I think I can show that there really i3 

 better reason than ^Ir. Wallace suj)poses for inferring a dis- 

 tinct relationshij) betwe(>u the fauna of the greater part of 

 Imlia and that of AtViea. Wi-rc the African atlinities of tlie 

 Indian fauna so small as would be inferred from the details 

 given in the ' Geographical Distribution of Animals,' vol. i. 

 pp. 321-320, I should have to confess that I had committed 

 a great error, and that Messrs. Blytli and Stoliczka were 

 equally mi-;taken in insisting on the strong Ethio])ian afHiiities 

 of the Indian fauna. A little consideration will, I think, show 

 that in some cases Mr. Wallace is mistaken, and that a care- 

 ful analysis of the whole question will lead to a different 

 conclusion. 



Before proceeding to criticise ^Ir. Wallace's lists I have 

 two remarks to make. I will preface them by saying that 

 nothing is further from my wish than to exj)ress an unfavour- 

 able opinion of ]^Ir. Wallace's work. I believe that he has 

 done his best to ai-rive at an unbiassed conclusion, and that 

 where he has failed, as in this instance I think he has, the 

 fault is chiefly that of the authorities on wdiom he had to 

 de])end. 



The tirst remark I have to make is this : — India is in con- 

 nexion with the Indo-.Malay countries; and w^de-ranging 

 species, of mammals and birds especially, find no impediment 

 in extending themselves throughout. This acts in two ways. 

 It hinders a tendency to the formation of distinct tyjies through 

 isolation ; and when a species by ranging to a distant region 

 becomes modified the links in the chain of modified forms are 

 more or less well ])reserved. If the whole of Burma, the 

 Malay peninsula, Siam, Sumatra, Java, ami tlic other 

 countries between India and China, south of the limits of the 

 Pala'arctic region, and as far east as the parallel of Canton, 

 had been buried beneath the sea since, at all events, a period 

 long antecedent to the glacial epoch, if, moreover, a belt of 

 well-wooded country extended across the Indian Ocean and 

 connected Eastern Africa witli India, we should probably find 



19* 



i 



