394 



ISLAND LIFE. 



[part II. 



and pleasant is it to speculate on former changes of land and 

 sea with which to cut the gordian knot offered by anomalies 

 of distribution, that we still continually meet with suggestions 

 of former continents stretching in every direction across the 

 deepest oceans, in order to explain the presence in remote parts 

 of the globe of the same genera even of plants or of insects — 

 organisms which possess such exceptional facilities both for ter- 

 restrial, aerial, and oceanic transport, and of whose distribution 

 in past ages we generally know absolutely nothing. 



The Birds of Madagascar, as indicating a supposed Lemurian 

 continent. — Having thus shown how the distribution of the land 

 mammalia and reptiles of Madagascar may be well explained by 

 the supposition of a union with Africa before the greater part of its 

 existing fauna had reached it, we have now to consider whether, 

 as some ornithologists think, the distribution and affinities of 

 the birds present an insuperable objection to this view, and 

 require the adoption of a hypothetical continent — Lemuria — 

 extending from Madagascar to Ce37lon and the Malay Islands. 



There are about one hundred land birds known from the island 

 of Madagascar, all but four or five being peculiar ; and about 

 half of these peculiar species belong to peculiar genera, many 

 of which are extremely isolated, so that it is often difficult to 

 class them in any of the recognised families, or to determine 

 their affinities to any living birds. Among the other moiety, 

 belonging to known genera, we find fifteen which have un- 

 doubted African affinities, while five or six are as decidedly 

 Oriental, the genera or nearest allied species being found in 

 India or the Malay Islands. It is on the presence of these 

 peculiar Indian types that Dr. Hartlaub, in his recent work on 

 the Birds of Madagascar and the Adjacent Islands, lays great 

 stress, as proving the former existence of " Lemuria ; " while he 

 considers the absence of such peculiar African famihes as the 

 plantain-eaters, glossy-starlings, ox-peckers, barbets, honey- 

 guides, hornbills, and bustards — besides a host of peculiar 

 African genera — as sufficiently disproving the statement in my 

 Geographical Distribution of Animals that Madagascar is " more 

 nearly related to the Ethiopian than to any other region," and 

 that its fauna was evidently " mainly derived from Africa." 



