Origin of Species Variorum

Comparison with 1872

In the same manner ... at the present day, we see that very many European productions cover the ground in La Plata, New Zealand, and to a lesser degree in Australia, and have ... beaten the natives; whereas extremely few southern forms have become naturalised in any part of Europe, though hides, wool, and other objects likely to carry seeds have been largely imported into Europe during the last two or three centuries from La Plata, and during the last forty or fifty years from Australia. The Neilgherrie mountains in India, however, offer a partial exception; for here, as I hear from Dr. Hooker, Australian forms are rapidly sowing themselves and becoming naturalised. Before the last great Glacial period, no doubt the intertropical mountains: no doubt before the Glacial period they were stocked with endemic Alpine forms; but these have almost everywhere largely yielded to the more dominant forms, generated in the larger areas and more efficient workshops of the north. In many islands the native productions are nearly equalled or even outnumbered, by those which have become naturalised; and ... this is the first stage towards their extinction. .. Mountains are islands on the land, and their inhabitants have yielded to those produced within the larger areas of the north, just in the same way as the inhabitants of real islands have everywhere yielded and are still yielding to continental forms naturalised through man's agency.

The same principles apply to the distribution of terrestrial animals and of marine productions, in the northern and southern temperate zones, and on the intertropical mountains. When during the height of the Glacial period the ocean-currents were widely different to what they now are, some of the inhabitants of the temperate seas might have reached the equator; of these a few would perhaps at once be able to migrate southward, by keeping to the cooler currents, whilst others might remain and survive in the cooler depths, until the southern hemisphere was in its turn subjected to a glacial climate and permitted of their further progress; in nearly the same manner as, according to Forbes, isolated spaces inhabited by Arctic productions exist to the present day in the deeper parts of the temperate seas.

I am far from supposing that all the difficulties in regard to the range and affinities of the identical and allied species which now live so widely separated

Just in the same manner as we see at the present day, that very many European productions cover the ground in La Plata, and in a lesser degree in Australia, and have to a certain extent beaten the natives; whereas extremely few southern forms have become naturalised in any part of the northern hemisphere, though hides, wool, and other objects likely to carry seeds have been largely imported into Europe during the last two or three centuries from La Plata, and during the last thirty or forty years from Australia. The Neilgherrie mountains in India, however, offer a partial exception; for here, as I hear from Dr. Hooker, Australian forms are rapidly sowing themselves and becoming naturalised. Before the Glacial period, no doubt the intertropical mountains ... were stocked with endemic Alpine forms; but these have almost every-where .. yielded to the more dominant forms, generated in the larger areas and more efficient workshops of the north. In many islands the native productions are nearly equalled, or even out-numbered, by those which have become naturalised there; and if the natives have not been actually exterminated, their numbers have been greatly reduced, and this is the first stage towards extinction. A mountain is an island on the land; and the intertropical mountains before the Glacial period must have been completely isolated; and I believe that the inhabitants of these islands on the land have yielded to those produced within the larger areas of the north, just in the same way as the productions of real islands have everywhere yielded to continental forms lately naturalised there through man's agency. ↑

I am very far from supposing that all difficulties in regard to the distribution and affinities of the allied species, which live