ocene,
or even to the Cretaceous, period. Some of these types have become
altogether extinct elsewhere; others have spread far and wide over the
globe, and have survived only in a few remote countries--and especially in
those which have been more or less secured by their isolated position from
the incursions of the more highly-developed forms of later times. This
explains why it is that the nearest allies of the Madagascar fauna and
flora are now so often to be found in South America or Australia--countries
in which low forms of mammalia and birds still largely prevail;--it being
on account of the long-continued isolation of all these countries that
similar forms (descendants of ancient types) are preserved in them. Had the
numerous suggested continental extensions connecting these remote
continents at various geological periods been realities, the result would
have been that all these interesting archaic forms, all these defenceless
insular types, would long ago have been exterminated, and one comparatively
monotonous fauna have reigned over the whole earth. So far from explaining
the anomalous facts, the alleged continental extensions, had they existed,
would have left no such facts to be explained.

* * * * *

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CHAPTER XX

ANOMALOUS ISLANDS: CELEBES

Anomalous Relations of Celebes--Physical Features of the
Island--Zoological Character of the Islands Around Celebes--The Malayan
and Australian Banks--Zoology of Celebes: Mammalia--Probable Derivation
of the Mammals of Celebes--Birds of Celebes--Bird-types Peculiar to
Celebes--Celebes not Strictly a Continental Island--Peculiarities of
the Insects of Celebes--Himalayan Types of Birds and Butterflies in
Celebes--Peculiarities of Shape and Colour of Celebesian
Butterflies--Concluding Remarks--Appendix on the Birds of Celebes.

The only other islands of the globe which can be classed as "ancient
continental" are the larger Antilles (Cuba, Haiti, Jamaica, and Porto
Rico), Iceland, and perhaps Celebes. The Antilles have been so fully
discussed and illustrated in my former work, and there is so little fresh
information about them, that I do not propose to treat of them here,
especially as they fall short of Madagascar in all points of biological
interest, and offer no problems of a different character from such as have
already been sufficiently explained.

Iceland, also, must apparently be classed a