1 6 GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION chap. 



the name of Triarctic ; but in the next year {Nature, xxvii. p. 606) 

 adopted for that union Prof. Newton's earlier term Holarctic. 

 Some other general schemes have been promulgated, as those of 

 M. Trouessart and Professor Mobius ; but they have found little 

 support, and with regard to the Class Aves, though certainly not with 

 regard to other groups as Pisces, or Mollusea, what is practically 

 the scheme of Mr. Sclater has met with acceptance, whether with 

 or without the modifications proposed by Huxley and Professor 

 Newton, there being really but two important points of difference — 

 (] ) the recognition of New Zealand as a distinct Kegion, and (2) the 

 union of the Nearctic and Palaearctic areas into a single Eegion. 

 It would be impossible here to set forth the arguments by which 

 these views are maintained or contested, and it must suffice to 

 trace briefly the outlines of the several districts. New Zealand, 

 if admitted as a distinct Eegion, consists only of the islands so 

 named, the smaller Chatham, Auckland, and Macquarrie groups, 

 Antipodes Island, Lord Howe, Norfolk and Kermadec Islands. 

 The Australian, if the preceding be cut off, will include Tasmania, 

 all Australia, and the islands to the northward as far as what has 

 been called " Wallace's Line " (between Lombok and Bali), Celebes, 

 New Guinea, New Britain, and all the countless groups of 

 tropical islands in the Pacific Ocean — except the Galapagos, which 

 undoubtedly belong to the next Eegion. The Neotropical is made 

 up of all South America, the Antilles and Central America, the 

 only doubt being whether to draw the northern boundary so as 

 to exclude or include Mexico, or even the southern part of the 

 United States. To this naturally succeeds, but with an indefinite 

 southern boundary, the Nearctic, comprising the whole of the 

 rest of North America to the shores of the Polar Sea, with the 

 addition of Greenland. Its north-western corner, Alaska, is now 

 known to be largely tenanted by forms from Asia, not found 

 elsewhere in America, and this is one of the chief reasons assigned 

 for uniting it with the Palaearctic area, which may be taken to 

 include Japan and all continental Asia to the north of China 

 proper, the Himalayas, the Persian Gulf and the east end of the 

 Mediterranean. Some authorities would add Northern Arabia 

 and Lower Egypt ; but all have agreed to include Tunis and the 

 ancient Mauritania — the Barbary States lying north of the Great 

 Desert to the Atlantic Ocean about Mogador, as well as the 

 Canaries, Madeira and the Azores, with the whole of Europe 



