The palæontologist, for example, traces the descent of the horse, which,
until its reintroduction by the Spaniards was unknown in the New World,
through a variety of intermediate forms, to the genus Orohippus occurring
in Eocene deposits in Utah and Wyoming. This animal was no larger than a
fox, and possessed four separated toes in front, and three behind.
Domestic cattle he refers to the Bos primigenius, and many existing
Carnivora to Tertiary forms such as the cave-bear, cave-lion, sabre-tiger,
and the like.
The zoologist groups the existing fauna into distinct provinces, and
demands, in explanation of the anomalies which these exhibit, the
reconstruction of large areas, of which only small outlying districts
remain at the present date, in many instances widely separated by oceans,
though once forming parts of the same continent; and so, for the simile
readily suggests itself, the workers in another branch of science,
Philology, argue from words and roots scattered like fossils through the
various dialects of very distant countries, a mutual descent from a common
Aryan language: the language of a race of which no historical record
exists, though in regard to its habits, customs, and distribution much may
be affirmed from the large collection of word specimens stored in
philological museums.
Thus Mr. Sclater, on zoological grounds, claims the late existence of a
continent which he calls Lemuria, extending from Madagascar to Ceylon and
Sumatra; and for similar reasons Mr. Wallace extends the Australia of
Tertiary periods to New Guinea and the Solomon Islands, and perhaps to
Fiji, and from its marsupial types infers a connection with the northern
continent during the Secondary period.
Again, the connection of Europe with North Africa during a late geological
period is inferred by many zoologists from the number of identical species
of mammalia inhabiting the opposite sides of the Mediterranean, and
palæontologists confirm this by the discovery of the remains of elephants
in cave-deposits in Malta, and of hippopotami in Gibraltar; while
hydrographers furnish the supplemental suggestive evidence that an
elevation of only fifteen hundred feet would be sufficient to establish
two broad connections between the two continents--so as to unite Italy
with Tripoli and Spain with Morocco, and to convert the Mediterranean Sea
into two great lakes, which appears, in fact, to have been its condition
during the Pliocene and Post Pliocene periods.
It was by means of these causeways that the large pachyderms entered
Britain, then united to the continent; and it was over them they retreated
when driven back by glacial conditions, their migration northward being
effectually prevented by the destruction of the connecting arms of land.
Some difference of opinion exists among naturalists as to the extent to
which zoological regions should be subdivided, and as to their respective
limitations.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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