as the name suggests, includes the whole of Africa except that portion
north of the Sahara desert, and Arabia and Egypt, with Madagascar and
other islands in the immediate vicinity. It seems hardly necessary to
even mention the forms that are peculiar to this peculiar region. Even
the word Africa brings trooping to our minds a whole continent of
peculiarities in more realms than one. Here we find the Ostrich, the
plantain eaters, the colies and several, other families—nine in all. Of
the lower groups there are the rollers, bee-eaters, horn-bills, the
curious secretary-bird and many others. It is significant that among the
Passerine birds there are but three families that are peculiar. So on
the whole, this region has not developed so rapidly as the Holarctic.
There has not been the intense struggle for supremacy here which we see
in the north temperate and higher regions.