The Hawaiian gazette. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1865-1918, 1885-10-27
Whero Did Life Begin.

menced. His researches, he says, have led
him to fix that point at the North Pole.
The doctor sustains his theory with much
energy and with a surprising array of
evidence, and this in turn throws much
light on the most vital of the current pro
blems Of biology, terrestrial physics, an
Gent cosmology, comparative mythology,
primeval history, scientific anthropology,
and Hebrew and ethnic traditions. He
claims to have given to the work the study
of many years. He says the poles were
first fitted to produce life, which conse-
quently commenced at the northern and
southern extremities of the globe, develop
ing Independently, but to a certain extent
corTespondingly, since conditions were
similar. By the secular cooling of the
globe the poles ultimately became untitled
to support life, and such forms as did not
perish in the changes of the earth's surface
slowl y migrated toward the equator, chang
ing IN the course of ages, and ultimately
giving rise to a fauna which, over most of
the globe, consists OF mixture of northern
and southern forms
Many facts derived from the Northern
Hemisphere lend support to this theory,
and the Southern Hemisphere has recently
added new facts which tell in the same
direction. The animals of the Northern
Hemisphere are still almost identical
throughout the worlds circuit. The same
families and even the same species of
mammals and birds are common to the
Old World and to the New To give few
examples, the elk or moose, the reindeer,
the beaver, the lynx, the wolf, the fox of
Europe and Asia, are specifically identi-
cal with those of America. The bison of
America is closely allied TO the aurochs of
Europe, the brown bear of Europe to our
own grizzly, the stage to the wapiti or elk,
and SO on.
Remains Of mammals now regarded as
tropical, such as the elephant, hippopo-
tamus, rhinoceros, hyena, lion, &c.-are
common in the tertiary strata of temperate
and even arctic regions. This is proof of
southern migration when climate changed.
In the southern point of South America,
in desolate Patagonia, have been found
mammalian remains which tend to show
that the tertiary fauna Of Patagonia pre-
coded that of the Argentine Republic, TO
the north of 1t. Forms of the pampas are
there, but are somewhat more generalised,
as though older Hooker has shown that
seventy seven species of plants are com
mon to South America, New Zealand, and
Tasmania. A small family of fishes
(galdridG) and the marsupialia (kangaroos,
wombat, oppossum, &c.,) are Australian
and South America
A sort of submarine plateau connects
Staten Island part of the Terra del Fuego
archipelago with South Georgia and other
antarctic lands, and it seems not unlikely
that great antarctic continent once exis
ted, the remains of which are Australia
New Zealand, &c, ON the one hand, and
Patagonia ON the other In Australia the
marsupialia multiplied and, spreading
northward, mingled with the boreal fauna
that had been driven southwark. In South
America the marsupialia did not greatly
multiply, though they spread, after the
upbeayal of the Isthmus of Panama, into
North America, where they are represented
by the oppossum.
The edentata (sloths, armadillos, ant
eaters, and their relations) first appeared
in Patagonia in the miocene period, and
spreading northward, became the charac-
teristic animals of South America Eden
tates (the aard-vark or Cape ant eater and
the pangolins or scaly ant-eaters) occur
also in Africa, which was probably once
connected southwark with the ancient
antarctic continent
In many cases the animals of northern
origin, which are the more numerous, can
be distinguished from the northern, but
in other cases we cannot distinguish them, |
since ON the one hand, animals which |
naturalists place in the same family on
account of resemblance in structure may
very possibly have had distinct ancestry, |
and, on the other hand, the northern forms, |
which evidently predominant, have not
only varied greatly in the course of ages,
but have penetrated far towards the south |
ern extremities of the continents. As re
CARDS the Northern Hemisphere, the re-
semblance between the fishes, insects, and
mollusca of the Old World and the New
are even more striking than those of the
higher animals. Scientific Press
EXPENSES OF BIG ARnEs.-John Bright
recently declared that the resources of the