FAUNA. 39 



but it is almost as remarkable for what is omitted in it as 

 for what it contains. Not only so, but from the position of 

 the island with regard to Africa — being separated from it by 

 a sea only 230 miles wide at its narrowest part, a distance 

 further reduced by a bank of soundings to only 1 60 miles — 

 one would also suppose that the fauna of the island would 

 largely resemble that of the continent. But it is remarkably 

 different : whole families of the larger mammalia are entirely 

 absent ; there are no representatives of the larger felines, no 

 lions, leopards, or hyaenas ; and none of the ungulate order, 

 except a single species of river-hog, sole relative of the 

 hippopotamus, rhinoceros, and buffalo ; and there is no zebra, 

 quagga, or giraffe, or any of the numerous families of ante- 

 lope which scour the African plains. There is no elephant 

 browsing in the wooded regions of Madagascar, and, stranger 

 still, there are no apes or monkeys living in its trees. The 

 few horses and asses found in the island are of recent intro- 

 duction by Europeans ; even the humped cattle, which exist in 

 immense herds, are probably not indigenous, but have been 

 brought at a somewhat remote period from Africa ; and the 

 hairy fat-tailed sheep and the few goats found in Madagas- 

 car are also of foreign introduction. 



But for all that, the sub-region — speaking zoologically — 

 of which Madagascar is the largest and most important por- 

 tion — is pronounced by every zoologist who has studied it to 

 be one of the most remarkable districts on the globe, bearing, 

 says Mr. Alfred Wallace, " a similar relation to Africa as the 

 Antilles to tropical America, or New Zealand to Australia, 

 but possessing a much richer fauna than either of these, and 

 in some respects a more remarkable one even than New 

 Zealand." The Madagascar fauna is very deficient in the 

 number of the orders and families of mammalia, but some 

 of these, especially the Lemuridae- among the Primates, the 

 ViverridEe among the Carnivora, and the Centetidas among the 

 Insectivora, are well represented in genera and species. 



I. will notice the mammalia in the order now generally 

 followed by zoologists in classifying this great division of 

 the vertebrate animals ; premising, however, that in the 

 following pages no pretension is made to exact or minute 



