ORNITHOLOGY OF THE ISLAND OF TOBAGO. 
continent, and that the types, however different specifically, can be 
referred to it; but whether these species, so called, formerly confined 
to some local circle or zone, which is sometimes the case on con- 
tinents, have been cut off from them entirely and completely — or 
that the force and change of food and climate, and insulated cir- 
cumstances, have modified the forms and size, or colours — or that 
the species have been transferred to those insulated lands by 
storms or currents, or other circumstances occurring through the 
agency of nature’s ordinary laws — or that these apparently dis- 
tinct forms have been the subjects of a separate creation altoge- 
ther we probably have not sufficient facts yet recorded thoroughly 
to understand. We know it to be a favourite theory with some, 
that a creation is presently going on, and some far off insulated 
points are quoted to prove this ; but if the greater attention to 
facts of how far species are distinct — what have been introduced 
species — and what possibility there was of those now known only 
as insulated to have been transported — will show even a proba- 
bility of existing laws being the carrying agents — we shall not re- 
quire to bring in the very convenient, and at the same time foi 
science, very dangerous solution, “ They have been created for the 
locality.” 
We find this local ornithology every where illustrated. In the 
great Eastern Archipelago, “ that long curved disjointed mass of 
land, broken by volcanic force from the south-eastern portion of the 
Asiatic continent,” the forms gradually blend away along the chain 
of islands, from those of the east of Europe and of India to those 
marking Australia. Taking only one race as an example ; Meh- 
phagous Birds at first appear few in individuals and species, but 
with every degree increase, until their great metropolis is reached ; 
while in turn they vanish in the far-distant New Zealand, itself 
giving birth to a very limited, but most singular, and in many in- 
stances, a fauna entirely its own. Still, through all this long range, 
the eastern type is recognized, while within its bounds we have re- 
markable instances of circumscribed or local distribution, as in t ie 
Paradise Birds, and the Ornithology of the Sandwich and Friendly 
Isles, or Pacific Fauna. Appertaining to Africa, we have the same 
facts brought out in the curious Ornithology of Madagascar. I 10 
types are truly African, but there are many species which we know 
of as inhabiting that island only, which exhibit very curious moditi- 
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