Chap. XII. 
OCEANIC ISLANDS. 
399 
those of Africa, like those of the Galapagos to America. 
I believe this grand fact can receive no sort of expla¬ 
nation on the ordinary view of independent creation; 
whereas on the view here maintained, it is obvious 
that the Galapagos Islands would be likely to receive 
colonists, whether by occasional means of transport or 
by formerly continuous land, from America; and the 
Cape de Verde Islands from Africa; and that such 
colonists would be liable to modificationthe principle 
of inheritance still betraying their original birthplace. 
Many analogous facts could be given: indeed it is an 
almost universal rule that the endemic productions of 
islands are related to those of the nearest continent, or 
of other near islands. The exceptions are few, and 
most of them can be explained. Thus the plants of 
Kerguelen Land, though standing nearer to Africa than 
to America, are related, and that very closely, as we 
know from Dr. Hooker’s account, to those of America: 
but on the view that this island has been mainly stocked 
by seeds brought with earth and stones on icebergs, 
drifted by the prevailing currents, this anomaly dis¬ 
appears. New Zealand in its endemic plants is much 
more closely related to Australia, the nearest mainland, 
than to any other region: and this is what might have 
been expected; but it is also plainly related to South 
America, which, although the next nearest continent, 
is so enormously remote, that the fact becomes an 
anomaly. But this difficulty almost disappears on the 
view that both New Zealand, South America, and 
other southern lands were long ago partially stocked 
from a nearly intermediate though distant point, namely 
from the antarctic islands, when they were clothed with 
vegetation, before the commencement of the Glacial 
period. The affinity, which, though feeble, I am assured 
by Dr. Hooker is real, between the flora of the south¬ 
western corner of Australia and of the Cape of Good 
