Identifier: geographicaldis01wall (find matches)
Title: Geographical distribution of animals : with a study of the relations of living and extinct faunas as elucidating the past changes of the earth's surface
Year: 1876 (1870s)
Authors: Wallace, Alfred Russel, 1823-1913
Subjects: Zoology
Publisher: London, Macmillan
Contributing Library: Robarts - University of Toronto
Digitizing Sponsor: University of Toronto

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ant Himalayan and Burmese countries.Its southern extremity, with Ceylon, has a moister climate andmore luxuriant vegetation, and exhibits indications of a formerextension southwards, with a richer and more peculiar fauna,partly Malayan and partly )Mascarene in its character. Thewhole southern slopes of the Himalayas, with Burmah, Siam andWestern China, as well as the Malay peninsula and the Indo-Malay islands, are almost everywhere covered with tropicalforests of the most luxuriant character, which abound in variedand peculiar forms of vegetable and animal life. The ilora andfauna of this extensive district arc essentially of one typethroughout; yet it may be us(^fully divided into the Indo-Chinese and the Malayan sub-regions, as each possesses annnibcr of pccidiar or characteristic animals. The former sub-region, besides having many tropical and sul)-troi)ical typesof its own, also possesses a large number of peculiarly modi-fied temperate forms on the mountain ranges of its northern
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CiiAi. xii.J THE UIUEMAL UKUlUN. 315 boundary, wliicli are ^vllolly wanting in the Malayan sub-region. The Philippine islands are best classed with the Indo-Malay group, although they are strikingly deficient in manyMalayan types, and exhibit an approach to the Celebesian divi-sion of the Austro-Malay sub-region. Zoological Characteristics of the Oriental Region.—The OrientalEegion possesses examples of 35 families of Mammalia, 71 ofBirds, 35 of Keptiles, 9 of Amj^hibia, and 13 of Fresh-waterFishes. Of these 163 families, 12 are peculiar to the region;namely, Tarsiida?, Galeopithecidse, and Tupaiidse among Mam-malia, while iEluridie, though confined to the higher Himalayas,may perhaps with more justice be claimed by the Palaiarctic re-gion ; Liotrichidifi, Phyllornithidse, and Eurylsemidse among birds;Xenopeltida3 (extending, however, to Celebes), Uropeltid?e, andAcrochordidie among reptiles; LuciocephalidaB, Ophiocephalidoeand Mastacembelida3 among fresh-water fishes. A number ofot

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