392 
ZOOLOGICAL GEOGRAPHY. 
[PABT lit. 
and among prevalent Oriental groups, Pycnonotidse (bulbuls), 
Phyllomithid® (green bulbuls), and Megalaemidae (barbets) are 
families whose absence is significant. Nine families are peculiar 
to the region, or only just pass its limits in the case of single 
species. These are Paridiseidae (paradise-birds), Meliphagidm 
(honey-suckers), Menuridse (lyre-birds), Atrichidae (scrub-birds), 
Cacatuidae (cockatoos), Platycercidae (broad-tailed and grass- 
paroquets), Trichoglossidae (brush -tongued paroquets, Megapo- 
diidae (mound-makers), and Casuariidae (cassowaries). There are 
also eight very characteristic families, of which four, — Pachy- 
cephalidaa (thick-headed shrikes), Campephagidae (caterpillar 
shrikes), Dicteidae (fiower-peckers), and Artamidm (swallow- 
shrikes) — are feebly represented elsewhere, while the other four 
— Ploceidie (weaver-finches), AlcEedmidae (kingfishers), Podargida? 
(frog-mouths), and Columbidae (pigeons) — although widely dis- 
tributed, are hefre unusually abundant and varied, and (except 
in the case of the Ploceidae) better represented in the Australian 
than in any other region. Of all these the Meliphagidae (honey- 
suckers) are the most peculiarly and characteristically Australian. 
This family abounds in genera and species ; it extends into every 
part of the region from Celebes and Lombock on the west, to 
the Sandwich Islands, Marquesas, and New Zealand on the east, 
while not a single species overpasses its limits, with the excep- 
tion of one (. Ptilotis limbata) which abounds in all the islands of 
the Timorese group, and has crossed the narrow strait from 
Lombock to Baly ; but this can hardly be considered to impugn 
the otherwise striking fact of wide diffusion combined with 
strict limitation, which characterizes it. This family is the more 
important, because, like the Trichoglossidae or brush-tongued 
paroquets, it seems to have been developed in co-ordination with 
that wealth of nectariferous flowering shrubs and trees which is 
one of the marked features of Australian vegetation. It probably 
originated in the extensive land-area of Australia itself, and 
thence spread into all the tributary islands, where it has become 
variously modified, yet always in such close adaptation to the 
other great features of the Australian fauna, that it seems unable 
to maintain itself when subject to the competition of the more 
