454 MR. A. MURRAY ON THE GEOGRAPHICAL RELATIONS OF 



which would be impassable to the one, may be easily crossed by the other. These epigeal 

 Tenebrionidse, moreover, are specially adapted for desert and sandy, arid districts. In a 

 very leafy or muddy country they would be out of place ; and such a country would 

 prove as effectual a barrier to their progress as the sea. Their presence in both 

 countries, more especially when South America seems to be separated by a barrier 

 impassable to them from the north, would have afforded a strong presumption that 

 they had once been united ; but their absence from both, or either, when the countries 

 are unfitted for their mode of life, Avill not prove much either way. So far as it 

 goes, however, its tendency would of course be against continuity. 



The number of American forms and alliances, although too distinct and decided and 

 too great to allow us to attempt to explain them away by accidental introduction, as by 

 the Longicornes being floated across the Atlantic in wood in which they may have existed 

 in the chrysalis state, &c., is at the same time too small in proportion to the general pre- 

 ponderance of true West-African forms to allow us to suppose that the continuity or 

 proximity, if it ever existed, was extensive or recent. And although there are certainly 

 some of the allied species which I have specially noticed, such as Galerita and Gonio- 

 tropis, whose presence it is very difficult to account for upon any other principle than 

 communication by contiguity, it cannot be said that this is beyond question. Some such 

 machinery as I have above referred to, of parallel descent from common more northern 

 ancestors, may, with the help of a lively imagination, ingeniously explain away ex- 

 ceptional cases, and relieve us from the difficulty of accounting for the facts otherwise 

 than by proximity or junction. And one important fact in favour of this is, that 

 we can point to a good many alliances between Old Calabar and the East Indies 

 of the same nature as those between it and South America, and these not alliances 

 with no interruption but the sea, but interrupted on each hand by wide and distinct 

 faunae. 



StiU I am bound to say that, after making every allowance, the impression which 

 remains on my mind is in favour of some sort of communication having existed between 

 West Africa and South America, south of, or nearly on the line of, the equator, inter- 

 rupted not only by a long breach of time, but probably also by wide spaces of dis- 

 continuity. 



2, The relations of the Coleoptera of Old Calabar to those of the eastern coast of Africa 

 are scarcely less interesting than they are to those of South America. They are not, 

 however, most developed in the same families. In the latter, the Lamellicornes have 

 occupied a very small place ; in Eastern Africa they occupy the chief place. The 

 Goliaths especially attract attention. On the eastern coast we have representative 

 or, rather, closely aUied species of the principal forms found on the west coast. The 

 true Goliaths are represented by Goliatlms Fornasmii. Several distinct species of Fu- 

 dicella are found on each coast. Biplognatha gagates and silicea are scarcely distin- 

 guishable. Some rare Heteromera, Dinoscelis, a subgenus of or genus allied to Pezo- 

 dontus, are found both in Mozambique and Old Calabar. The Lycidse are in some 

 instances identical, and in others very closely allied. The related Longicornes are no 

 less numerous ; and, in addition to actual instances of affinity, the Old-Calabar species 



