190 FERNANDO NORONHA. [CH. IV 



are Iguanoids — a family otherwise restricted to America. 

 The Chamseleons are very abundant in Madagascar, more 

 so than in any other part of the world, though they are by 

 no means limited to the island. As with mammals and 

 birds the reptiles which are remarkable for their absence 

 are as numerous as those which are noteworthy for their 

 presence. The most striking example is perhaps the 

 large group of Monitor Lizards, which abound not only in 

 Africa but in many parts of the old world, to which 

 division of the globe they are confined. Some further 

 facts about the zoology of Madagascar will be found on 

 page 176 et seq., apropos of its relations to India. 



The Fauna of Fernando Noronha. 



The island of Fernando Noronha lies at a distance of 

 194 miles N.-E. from Cape San Koque on the coast of 

 Brazil. • It consists now of an archipelago of small islands ; 

 but the original discoverer, Amerigo Vespucci, speaks of 

 it as one island; it seems probable therefore that the 

 splitting up into an archipelago has occurred within the 

 last 400 years. The recent formation of an archipelago is 

 also rendered probable by the fact that the individual 

 islets have not their peculiar inhabitants, but that — in the 

 words of Mr Ridley *, whose report upon its zoology has 

 furnished me with the material for the present section — 

 "almost all the species noted occur on all the islands 

 suitable for their existence." This is entirely different to 

 the older oceanic archipelagos, such as the Sandwich 



1 Trans. Linn. Soc. 1886. 



