52 
DISTRIBUTION OF ANIMALS. 
[part I. 
genus ; and that belongs to an Order, “ Insectivora,” entirely 
absent from South America, and to a family, “ Centetidae,” all 
the other species of which inhabit Madagascar only. And as 
if to add force to this singular correspondence we have one 
Madagascar species of a beautiful day-flying Moth, Urania , all 
the other species of which inhabit tropical America. These 
insects are gorgeously arrayed in green and gold, and are quite 
unlike any other Lepidoptera upon the globe. 
The island of Ceylon generally agrees in its productions with 
the Southern part of India ; yet it has several birds which are 
allied to Malayan and not to Indian groups, and a fine butterfly 
of the genus Hestia , as well as several genera of beetles, which 
are purely Malayan. 
Various important groups of animals are distributed in a 
way not easy to explain. The anthropoid apes in AVest Africa 
and Borneo ; the tapirs in Malaya and South America ; the 
camel tribe in the deserts of Asia and the Andes ; the trogons 
in South America and Tropical Asia, with one species in Africa; 
the marsupials in Australia and America, are examples. 
The cases here adduced (and they might be greatly multiplied) 
are merely to show the kind of problems with which the 
naturalist now has to deal ; and in order to do so he requires 
some system of geographical arrangement, which shall serve 
the double purpose of affording a convenient subdivision of his 
subject, and at the same time of giving expression to the main 
results at which he has arrived. Hence the recent discussions 
on “ Zoological Regions,” or, what are the most natural 
primary divisions of the earth as regards its forms of animal 
life. 
The divisions in use till quite recently were of two kinds ; 
either those ready made by geographers, more especially the 
quarters or continents of the globe; or those determined by 
climate and marked out by certain parallels of latitude or by 
isothermal lines. Either of these methods was better than 
none at all; but from the various considerations explained in 
the preceding chapters, it will be evident, that such divisions 
must have often been very unnatural, and have disguised many 
