[On the Origin of Species by Charles Darwin]@TWC D-Link bookOn the Origin of Species CHAPTER XI 35/42
We see the same law in this author's restorations of the extinct and gigantic birds of New Zealand.
We see it also in the birds of the caves of Brazil.
Mr.Woodward has shown that the same law holds good with sea-shells, but, from the wide distribution of most molluscs, it is not well displayed by them.
Other cases could be added, as the relation between the extinct and living land-shells of Madeira; and between the extinct and living brackish water-shells of the Aralo-Caspian Sea. Now, what does this remarkable law of the succession of the same types within the same areas mean? He would be a bold man who, after comparing the present climate of Australia and of parts of South America, under the same latitude, would attempt to account, on the one hand through dissimilar physical conditions, for the dissimilarity of the inhabitants of these two continents; and, on the other hand through similarity of conditions, for the uniformity of the same types in each continent during the later tertiary periods.
Nor can it be pretended that it is an immutable law that marsupials should have been chiefly or solely produced in Australia; or that Edentata and other American types should have been solely produced in South America.
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