CHAP, xxvii.] OF THE MOLVCCAS. 145 



country. On the other hand, such wide-spread groups as 

 the thrushes, warblers, and finches, which in India form 

 nearly one-third of all the land-birds, dwindle down in the 

 Moluccas to one-fourteenth. 



The reason of these peculiarities appears to be, that the 

 Moluccan fauna has been almost entirely derived from 

 that of New Guinea, in which country the same deficiency 

 and the same luxuriance is to be observed. Out of the 

 seventy-eight genera in which the Moluccan land-birds 

 may be classed, no less than seventy are characteristic of 

 New Guinea, while only six belong specially to the Indo- 

 Malay islands. But this close resemblance to New Guinea 

 genera does not extend to the species, for no less than 140 

 out of the 195 land-birds are peculiar to the Moluccan 

 islands, while 32 are found also in New Guinea, and In 

 in the Indo-Malay islands. These facts teach us, that 

 though the birds of this group have evidently been derived 

 mainly from New Guinea, yet the immigration has not 

 been a recent one, since there has been time for the greater 

 portion of the species to have become changed. We find, 

 also, that many very characteristic New Guinea forms 

 have not entered the Moluccas at all, while others found 

 in Ceram and Gilolo do not extend so far west as Bouru. 

 Considering, further, the absence of most of the New Guinea 

 mammals from the Moluccas, we are led to the conclusion 

 that these islands are not fragments which have been 



VOL. II. L 



