on; and wherever the
vegetable element predominates, the animal is subordinated. We must not
look, therefore, for a large amount or variety of animal life in the
Ecuadorian forests. Time was when colossal megatheroids, mastodons, and
glyptodons browsed on the foliage of the Andes and the Amazon; but now
the terrestrial mammals of this tropical region are few and diminutive.
They are likewise old-fashioned, inferior in type as well as bulk to
those of the eastern hemisphere, for America was a finished continent
long before Europe. "It seems most probable (says Darwin) that the North
American elephants, mastodons, horse, and hollow-horned ruminants
migrated, on land since submerged near Behring's Straits, from Siberia
into North America, and thence, on land since submerged in the West
Indies, into South America, where for a time they mingled with the forms
characteristic of that southern continent, and have since become
extinct."[42] The rise of the Mexican table-land split up the New World
into two well-defined zoological provinces. A few species, as the puma,
peccari, and opossum, have crossed the barrier; but South America is
characterized by possessing a family of monkeys, the llama, tapir, many
peculiar rodents, and several genera of edentates.

[Footnote 42: _Journal of Researches_, p. 132.]

The tapir, the largest native quadruped, is sometimes found on the
mountains, but never descends into the Quito Valley. A link between the
elephant and hog, its true home is in the lowlands. The tapir and
peccari (also found on the Andean slopes) are the only indigenous
pachyderms in South America, while the llama[43] and deer (both
abounding in the valley) are the only native ruminants; there is not one
native hollow-horned ruminant on the continent. The llama is the only
native domesticated animal; indeed, South America never furnished any
other animal serviceable to man: the horse, ox, hog, and sheep (two,
four, and six-horned), are importations. Of these animals, which
rendered such important aid in the early civilization of Asia and
Europe, the genera even were unknown in South America four centuries
ago; and to-day pure Indians with difficulty acquire a taste for beef,
mutton, and pork. The llama is still used as a beast of burden; but it
seldom carries a quintal more than twelve miles a day. The black bear of
the Andes ascends as high as Mont Blanc, and is rarely found below three
thousand five hundred feet. The puma, o