These Were Already Sufficiently Protected
From Their Enemies, And Did Not Require Increased Power Of
Escaping From Them.
It is not at all clear what effect the
peculiar curvature of the wings has in modifying flight.
Another curious feature in the zoology of Celebes is also worthy
of attention. I allude to the absence of several groups which are
found on both sides of it, in the Indo-Malay islands as well as
in the Moluccas; and which thus seem to be unable, from some
unknown cause, to obtain a footing in the intervening island. In
Birds we have the two families of Podargidae and Laniadae, which
range over the whole Archipelago and into Australia, and which
yet have no representative in Celebes. The genera Ceyx among
Kingfishers, Criniger among Thrushes, Rhipidura among
Flycatchers, Calornis among Starlings, and Erythrura among
Finches, are all found in the Moluccas as well as in Borneo and
Java - but not a single species belonging to any one of them is
found in Celebes. Among insects, the large genus of Rose-chafers,
Lomaptera, is found in every country and island between India and
New Guinea, except Celebes. This unexpected absence of many
groups, from one limited district in the very centre of their
area of distribution, is a phenomenon not altogether unique, but,
I believe, nowhere so well marked as in this case; and it
certainly adds considerably to the strange character of this
remarkable island.
The anomalies and eccentricities in the natural history of
Celebes which I have endeavoured to sketch in this chapter, all
point to an origin in a remote antiquity.
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