Publisher's Synopsis
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1876 edition. Excerpt: ...are peculiar to it; a proportion not much short of two-thirds. Of land birds there are 294 genera, of which 179 are peculiar; giving a proportion of a little less than three-fifths. Compared with the Oriental region this shows a considerably larger amount of speciality under all the heads; but the superiority is mainly due to the wonderful and isolated fauna of Madagascar, to which the Oriental region has nothing comparable. Without this the regions would be nearly equal. Insects: Lepidoptera.--11 out of the 16 families of butterflies have representatives in Africa, but none are peculiar. Acrabidae is one of the most characteristic families, and there are many interesting forms of Nymphalidae, Lycaeuidse, and Papilionidae. The peculiar or characteristic forms are Amauris (Danaidse); Gnophodes, Leptoneura, Bicyclus, Hcteropsis and Ccenyra (Satyridas); Aercea (Acraeidsae); Lachvoptera, Precis, Sala1nis, Crenis, Godartia, Amphidema, Pseudaercea, Catuna, Euryphene, Rmnalccosoma, Hamanumida, Aterica, Hamia, Meneris, Charaxes, and Philognoma (Nymphalidae); Pentila, Liptena, Ihtrbania, Zeritis, Capyot, Phytala, Epitola, Hewitsonia and Deloneura (Lycaeuidae); Pseudopontia, Idmais, Teracolus, Callosune (Pieridae); Abantis, Ceratrichia and Caprona (Hes-peridae). The total number of species known is about 750; which is very poor for an extensive tropical region, but this is not to be wondered at when the nature of much of the country is considered. It is also, no doubt, partly due to our comparative ignorance of the great equatorial forest district, which is the only part likely to be very productive in this order of insects. Coleoptera.--In our first representative family, Cicindelidae or tiger-beetles, the Ethiopian region is rather rich, having...
