Golden Moles (Chrysochloride), a family containing but one genus, Chrysochloris, with seven species all confined to the Ethiopian Region. Summary and Deductions as regards the Insectivores Table of the families and genera of the Order Insectivora, showing the approximate number of species in each of the Regions. 1. The Order Insectivora consists of ten rather isolated family groups, distributed generally over the earth, except in Australia, where they are absent, and the Malagasy Sub-region and South America, where they are very feebly represented. 2. About 230 species of Insectivores are recognized, arranged in forty-one genera. 3. The most numerous and all-pervading group of Insectivores is the Shrews (Soricida), of which upwards of 120 species are known. 4. Many of the families of Insectivores are excessively local in distribution, the Kaguans and Tree-shrews being peculiar to the Oriental Region, the Elephant-shrews and Golden Moles to Africa, the Solenodonts to the Greater Antilles, and the Tenrecs to Madagascar. SECTION III.-DISTRIBUTION OF BATS (a) Introductory Remarks The Bats, which constitute the Order Chiroptera, are, after the Rodents, the most numerous of all mammals, upwards of 530 species being already recognized, and many others probably awaiting further researches. As regards their distribution, it must be recollected that their powers of flight, which render them capable of passing over tracts of water that could not be crossed by other small mammals, place them in a somewhat different category from ordinary Mammals. At the same time the mode of their occurrence on the earth's surface presents many interesting features, concerning which a few words should be said. In these remarks, however, we shall be brief, as the Bats are not creatures of general interest, and as a rule are little studied except by the scientific worker. (b) Chief Points in the Distribution of Bats The first point to be noticed in the distribution of this extensive Order is, that the members are divisible into two well-marked and easily recognized sections. To the first of these belong the fruit-eating Bats of the family of Pteropodidæ, sometimes recognized as a Sub-order under the title "Megachiroptera." This section contains about 110 species, divided into eighteen genera, the whole of which are entirely confined to the tropical and sub-tropical portions of the Eastern Hemisphere, and are quite unknown in the New World. They are spread over the Ethiopian, Oriental, and Australian Regions, the African forms, about five in number, being mostly generically distinct and peculiar to that continent. One of the most remarkable of these is Epomophorus, distinguished for its large lips and capacious mouth, of which eleven or twelve species occur in the Ethiopian tropics. In the Oriental and Australian Regions Epomophorus is replaced by Pteropus, with as many as fifty or sixty species. It is a remarkable fact that Pteropus has never reached the African continent, although two of its species occur in the Comoro Islands, only about 200 miles distant from the African coast. Passing onwards to the five families of Insectivorous Bats, we find the two first of these, the Rhinolophide and Nycterida also absent in the New World, although they are distributed in larger or smaller numbers over most portions of the Old World, including Australia. The fourth family, Vespertilionidæ, which is the most numerous group of all, embracing some 200 species and twenty |