The geographical distribution of animals, with a study of the relations ...

—404 ZOOLOGICAL GEOGRAPHY. [part hi.which are absent from Australia proper. Such of these as arecommon to the Malay archipelago as a whole, have been alreadynoted;we shall here confine ourselves more especially to thegroups peculiar to the region, which are almost all eitherAustralian or Austro-Malayan, the Pacific Islands and NewZealand being very poor in insect life.Lepidoptera.—Australia itselfis poor in butterflies, except inits northern and more tropical parts, where green Ornithopterceand several other Malayan forms occur. In South Australiathere are less than thirty-five species, whereas in Queensland thereare probably over a hundred. The peculiar Australian formsare few. In the family Satyridae, Xenica and Heteronympha,with Hypocista extending to New Guinea ; among the Lycaenidae,Ogyris and Utica are confined to Australia proper, andRypochrysops to the region ; and in Papilionidae, the remarkableEiirycus is confined to Australia, but is allied to Euryades,a genus found in Temperate South America (La Plata), and tothe Pamassius of the North-Temperate zone.The Austro-Malay sub-region has more peculiar forms. Hamadryas,a genus of Danaidae, approximates to some South Americanforms ; Hyades and Hyantis are remarkable groups of Morphidae;Mynes and Prothoe are fine Nymphalidae, the former extending toQueensland ;Dicallaneura, a genus of Erycinidae, and Elodina,of Pieridae, are also peculiar forms. The fine ^Egeus group ofPapilio, and Priamus group of Ornithoptera, also belong exclusivelyto this region.Xois is confined to the Fiji Islands, Bletogona to Celebes, andAcropthalmia to New Zealand, all genera of Satyridae. Seventeengenera in all are confined to the Australian region.Among the Sphingina, Pollanisus, a genus of Zygaenidae, isAustralian ;also four genera of Castniidae Synemon, Euschemon,Damias, and Cocytia, the latter being confined to the Papuanislands. The occurrence of this otherwise purely South Americanfamily in the Australian region, as well as the affinity of Eurycusand Euryades noticed above, is interesting ; but as we have seenthat the genera and families of insects are more permanent thanthose of the higher animals, and as the groups in question are