chap, xviii.] OF CELEBES. 445 



these islands had not risen above the ocean. Such an 

 antiquity is necessary, to account for the number ot 

 animal forms it possesses, which show no relation to those 

 of India or Australia, but rather with those of Africa ; and 

 we are led to speculate on the possibility of there having 

 once existed a continent in the Indian Ocean which might 

 serve as a bridge to connect these distant countries. Now 

 it is a curious fact, that the existence of such a land has 

 been already thought necessary, to account for the distri- 

 bution of the curious Quadrumana forming the family of 

 the Lemurs. These have their metropolis in Madagascar, 

 but are found also in Africa, in Ceylon, in the penin- 

 sula of India, and in the Malay Archipelago as far as 

 Celebes, which is its furthest eastern limit. Dr. Sclater 

 has proposed for the hypothetical continent connecting 

 these distant points, and whose former existence is 

 indicated by the Mascarene islands and the Maldive coral 

 group, the name of Lemuria. Whether or no we believe in 

 its existence in the exact form here indicated, the student 

 of geographical distribution must see in the extraordinary 

 and isolated productions of Celebes, proofs of the former 

 existence of some continent from whence the ancestors of 

 these creatures, and of many other intermediate forms, 

 could have been derived. 



In this short sketch of the most striking peculiarities of 

 the Natural History of Celebes, I have been obliged to enter 



