ZOO-GEOGRAPHICAL NOTES. 391 



district (where they are kept in herds for the sake of their 

 milk) do not last long. One of my favourite schemes is an 

 attempt to acclimatise buffaloes, which, in my opinion, would 

 be well suited to the country. Unfortunately I have not yet 

 been able to procure any tame buffaloes, and those in this 

 country, even when they are caught young and grow up with 

 the cows, are always rather wild. Two two-year-old cows are 

 here at the present moment. I have introduced rabbits, 

 which are doing well, and promise to thrive. A large duck 

 thrives, and multiplies in a remarkable manner ; it is similar 

 to the so-called Turkish duck ; I bought the original birds 

 from the Zanzibar Arabs settled in Uganda, and they have 

 spread over the whole of our province, just like the Papaw-tree. 

 Pigeons do not thrive everywhere, chiefly owing to the nume- 

 rous birds of prey, which decimate them. 



2. Zoo-Geographical Notes. 



geographical problems of the african tropical fauna — limits of 

 Wallace's zoo-geographical regions — migration of animals and 

 its causes — african and european birds of passage — diversity 

 of their migrations — southern limit of european visitors — 

 migrating fishes — great line of separation from south-east 

 to north-west — the region of steppes and forests of the 

 bahr-el-jebel — animals characteristic of the steppes and 

 forests — the geographical distribution of the grey parrot — 

 the chimpanzee — scarcity of birds of prey. 



Lado, December 1884. 

 The study of the tropical fauna of Africa has in many respects 

 peculiar claims on our attention ; for, in the first place, forms 

 most closely connected with those characteristic of it at the 

 present time, appear in the miocene deposits of Europe, so that 

 this fauna occupies a most exceptional position as regards its 

 antiquity, geological antiquity I might say, compared with the 

 existing types of later date. And, indeed, the camelopard, 

 hippopotamus, Orycteropus (Cape ant-eater), and others be- 

 longing to a period of creation long passed away, intrude 

 as anomalies into our times. But it is not antiquity alone 



