"^'iSi!^,i:t" ^MMm in the Uni.

244
INSECTA, COLEOPTERA.
South and Central America east of the Andes and north of the River Plate,
and furnishes a large share in the constitution of North America, receiving in
turn a very perceptible tinge from the microtypal stirps. The microtypal
stirps includes Europe, Asia north of the Himalayas, Eastern North America
(so far as not modified by the Brazilian element), and (in a less degree) Northwest
America, California, part of Mexico, Peru, Chili, the Argentine Republic
south of Tucuman, Patagonia, Tierra del Fuego, Polynesia, New Zealand,
and Australia. The apparent paradox of including the first and last of
these countries in the same stirps is endeavoured to be accounted for by the
inference, from the fact of the Eocene flora of Europe having many points of
correlation with the present Australian flora, and from the author's supposition
of the probability of the European Eocene beetle-fauna having been the same
as the Miocene (based upon Heer's proof that the Miocene beetle-fauna of
Europe was of the same type as at present), that the Eocene fauna of Em-ope
has (like the Eocene flora of Australia) survived in its Eocene form down to
the present day. The author's conviction is that there have been almost certainly
two great continental routes of communication between the northern
and southern hemispheres—one now at the bottom of the Pacific, the other
of the Atlantic. The beetle-fauna? of the Madeiran Isles and of the Azores, as
enumerated by Wollaston and Crotch, are considered substantially to corroborate
the microtypal stirps, the European element (hitherto held to have
been introduced) being treated as natural denizens. The entire fauna of St.
Helena is discussed at some length (the -author admitting that that island is
the crucial test of his hypothesis of a communication between the northern
and southern hemispheres by an Atlantic continent), and is regarded as belonging
to the Atlantic subfauna of the microtypal stirps. Eastward, this
stirps is traced through Siberia, China (due stress being given to the prevalence
there of European forms), and Japan (where, however, as in China, the
Hymenoptera are wholly different from the European type), to North America,
thence, vid California, to Mexico and the other South-American countries
above mentioned. Coast- and cave-beetles, and the occasional occurrence
of European genera, are relied upon as strong evidence of all these belonging
to the same stirps,—the occurrence of South-African forms in South
America being accounted for by a submerged Patagonian continent, which
may have existed at three different epochs. The non-coral isles of Polynesia
are claimed as microtypal, again chiefly on the ground of their possessing
British forms ; and the European affinities of a very considerable portion of
the ingredients of the Coleopterous fauna of Australia are stated to be without
doubt,—some peculiarly Australian forms being also thought to be local
representatives of South-American (and therefore) European races. The
common want of certain conspicuous families or genera by Australia and the
microtypal stirps in other countries is relied upon by the author as a
connecting link; and the Miocene epoch supplies some missing forms.
As regards the Indo-African stirps, the author's chief points are his present
conviction (opposed to Wallace's opinion) that the Coleoptera of the New-
Guinea islands are essentially Indo-Malayan,—that, although Africa (south of
the Sahara) is better entitled to claim rank as a separate province than India,
there was but one original stock for both, as most of the genera occurring in
one are found, under suitable conditions, in the other, and some large groups
(e. g. Staphyliuidce) are absent in both of them,—that Africa was disjoined