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

406 ZOOLOGICAL GEOGRAPHY. [part hi,No country on the globe can offer such an extraordinary set ofbirds as are here depicted.Reptiles.—These consistno land-snakes and only one frog.almost wholly of lizards, there beingTwelve species of lizards areknown, belonging to three genera, one of which is peculiar, asare all the species.Hinulia, with two species, and Mocoa, withfour species (one of which extends to the Chatham Islands),belong to the Scincidse ; both are very wide-spread genera andoccur in Australia. The peculiar genus Naultinns, with six species,belongs to the Geckotidse, a family spread over the whole world.The most extraordinary and interesting reptile of New Zealandis, however, the Hatteria punctata, a lizard-like animalliving in holes, and found in small islands on the north-eastcoast, and more rarely on the main land.It is somewhat intermediatein structure between lizards and crocodiles, and also hasbird-like characters in the form of. its ribs. It constitutes, notonly a distinct family, Rhyncocephalidse, but a separate order ofreptiles, Khyncocephalina. It is quite isolated from all othermembers of the class ; and is probably a slightly modified representativeof an ancient and generalised form, which has beensuperseded in larger areas by the more specialized lizards andsaurians.The only representatives of the Ophidia are two sea-snakesof Australian and Polynesian species, and of no geographicalinterest.Amphibia.—The solitary frog indigenous to New Zealand,belongs to a peculiar genus, Liopelma, and to the family Bomburatoridse,otherwise confined to Europe and temperate SouthAmerica.Fresh-water Fishes.—There are, according to Captain Hutton,15 species of fresh-water fish in New Zealand, belonging to 7genera ; six species, and one genus (Retropinna), being peculiar.Betropinna richardsoni belongs to the Salmonidae, and is theonly example of that family occurring in the Southern hemisphere,where it is confined to New Zealand and the ChathamIslands.The wide distribution of Galaxias attennatus—from the