Page:The naturalist on the River Amazons 1863 v1.djvu/129

 as these, we must compare closely the species found in the district with those of the other contiguous regions, and endeavour to ascertain whether they are identical, or only slightly modified, or whether they are highly peculiar.

Von Martius, when he visited this part of Brazil forty years ago, coming from the south, was much struck with the dissimilarity of the animal and vegetable productions to those of other parts of Brazil. In fact, the Fauna of Pará, and the lower part of the Amazons, has no close relationship with that of Brazil proper; but it has a very great affinity with that of the coast region of Guiana, from Cayenne to Demerara. If we may judge from the results afforded by the study of certain families of insects, no peculiar Brazilian forms are found in the Pará district; whilst more than one-half the total number are essentially Guiana species, being found nowhere else but in Guiana and Amazonia. Many of them, however, are modified from the Guiana type, and about one-seventh seem to be restricted to Pará. These endemic species are not highly peculiar, and they may be yet found over a great part of Northern Brazil when the country is better explored. They do not warrant us in concluding that the district forms an independent province, although they show that its Fauna is not wholly derivative, and that the land is probably not entirely a new formation. From all these facts, I think we must conclude that the Pará district belongs to the Guiana province, and that, if it is newer land than Guiana, it must have received the great bulk of its animal population from that region. I am informed by Dr. Sclater