NEW GUINEA. 51 



cc^nections which New Guinea previously had through the Moluccas with the 

 Malayan islands were narrow necks of land where standing water was probably 

 almost non-existent, and that for this reason the engystomatids which had 

 taken up this method of development were the most fitted to pass over these 

 commissures to what is now New Guinea itself. Members of the family occur 

 throughout the whole area, but only sparingly until the Papuan region is reached, 

 where they immediately become the most prominent feature of the amphibian 

 fauna, and attain to an enormous diversity. 



Van Kampen's views have been well expressed twice : once in a paper on, 

 the amphibian fauna of New Guinea (Nova Guinea — Resultats de I'expedi- 

 tion scientifique Neerlandaise a la Nouvelle Guinee. Zool. 1909, 9, p. 31-49, 

 pi. 2) ; and again in a most enlightening lecture which he delivered before the 

 Royal natural history society of Batavia, entitled "De zoogeografie van den 

 Indischen Archipel (Separate from Bijblad, Natuurkundig tijdschrift voor 

 Ned.-Indie, 1909, 3, 4, p. 1-24, map). Of this I have published an English 

 translation (Amer. nat., 1911, 45, p. 537-560). 



The chelonians of New Guinea, while not abundant in number of species, 

 nevertheless show a strong differentiation, which is hardly paralleled by any 

 other group of animals found upon the island and not by chelonians elsewhere 

 in the world. In the first place, we find a relative of the American Chelydra, 

 a peculiar species, which Douglas Ogilby named Devisia mythodes. This rare 

 and strange form was discovered in British New Guinea, and the type is now in 

 the Sydney museum. Its affinities are, broadly speaking, American, and so far 

 as we know at present that is about all that can be said of it. Its habits are 

 unknown and it remains probably the most remarkable known example of 

 discontinuous distribution. 



Four other genera of turtles are recorded; of which one, Caretochelys in- 

 sculpta Ramsay, is not only peculiar to the island, but represents a genus similar 

 in structure to the pelagic turtles; it is confined to the Fly River of British New 

 Guinea. This species again is known by but few specimens, and its habits 

 are as yet largely unknown. The occurrence of Pelochelys cantoris Gray is of 

 peculiar interest, inasmuch as, while the creature is common upon the mainland 

 of southeastern Asia, in the Philippines, and on Borneo and Sumatra, it has 

 only recently been recorded from British Papua and has not been found upon 

 the intervening islands. The other two genera represented are Chelodina, 

 with two species, — one, C. novae-guineae Blgr., which is found upon the island 

 of Timor and in British Papua; the other, C. siehenrocki Werner, which is con- 



