80 DIFFERENT DIVISIONS OF EARTH'S SURFACE. [CH. II 



in the first place between the Old and New Worlds : Asia 

 and Australia are nearer together than either of them is 

 to Africa ; and Africa is more nearly akin to Europe than 

 to any other region. New Zealand forms a region quite 

 apart from the others. 



The earthworms on the other hand do not show so 

 marked a distinction between the Old and the New 

 Worlds ; indeed they offer the best evidence of any group 

 in favour of the Holarctic region. The Ethiopian region 

 is very distinct, perhaps the most distinct of all. The 

 Australian region is barely separable from the Oriental. 

 It is quite necessary, in order to emphasise the facts 

 of distribution in this group, to constitute an Antarctic 

 region embracing New Zealand and Patagonia. 



The Batrachians are again quite different from either 

 of the other two groups considered. The Neotropical and 

 the Australian really form one big region ; so also do the 

 Ethiopian and the Oriental; on the other hand the 

 Nearctic and the Palsearctic are quite distinct ; there can 

 be no question here of a Holarctic realm. 



To express in a graphic form the distribution of the 

 land Planarians is a simpler matter than in the case of 

 any of the other groups. 



The following pages contain schemes of the distribu- 

 tion of some of these groups which are compared with the 

 Insecta whose range in space and peculiarities of distribu- 

 tion I have not treated of at all. The diagrams of most of 

 these are taken from M. Trouessart's book already referred 

 to more than once and they represent the latest and most 

 reliable information from specialists on the several groups. 



