Origin of Species Variorum

Comparison with 1861

an island by some other means; and the plant then becoming slightly modified, but still retaining its hooked seeds, would form an endemic species, having as useless an appendage as any rudimentary organ,— for instance, as the shrivelled wings under the soldered elytra of many insular beetles. Again, islands often possess trees or bushes belonging to orders which elsewhere include only herbaceous species; now trees, as Alph. de Candolle has shown, generally have, whatever the cause may be, confined ranges. Hence trees would be little likely to reach distant oceanic islands; and an herbaceous plant, though it would have no chance of suc- cessfully competing in stature with a fully developed tree, when established on an island and having to compete with herbaceous plants alone, might readily gain an advantage by growing taller and taller and overtopping the other plants. If so, natural selection would often tend to add to the stature of herbaceous plants when growing on an oceanic island, to whatever order they belonged, and thus convert them first into bushes and ultimately into trees. ↑

With respect to the absence of whole orders on oceanic islands, Bory St. Vincent long ago remarked that Batrachians (frogs, toads, newts) have never been found on any of the many islands with which the great oceans are studded. I have taken pains to verify this assertion, and I have found it strictly true. I have, however, been assured that a frog exists on the mountains of the great island of New Zealand; but I suspect that this exception (if the information be correct) may be explained through glacial agency.

an island by some other means; and the plant then becoming slightly modified, but still retaining its hooked seeds, would form an endemic species, having as useless an appendage as any rudimentary organ,— for instance, as the shrivelled wings under the soldered elytra of many insular beetles. Again, islands often possess trees or bushes belonging to orders which elsewhere include only herbaceous species; now trees, as Alph. de Candolle has shown, generally have, whatever the cause may be, confined ranges. Hence trees would be little likely to reach distant oceanic islands; and an herbaceous plant, though it might have no chance of successfully competing on a continent with many fully developed trees, when established on an island and having to compete with herbaceous plants alone, might readily gain an advantage over them by growing taller and overtopping them. If so, natural selection would often tend to add to the stature of herbaceous plants when growing on oceanic islands, to whatever order they belonged, and thus convert them first into bushes and ultimately into trees.

Absence of Batrachians and Terrestrial Mammals on Oceanic Islands .

With respect to the absence of whole orders on oceanic islands, Bory St. Vincent long ago remarked that Batrachians (frogs, toads, newts) have never been found on any of the many islands with which the great oceans are studded. I have taken pains to verify this assertion, and .. have found it strictly true, with the exception of New Zealand, of the Andaman Islands, and perhaps of the Salomon Islands. But I have already remarked that it is doubtful whether New Zealand ought to be classed as an oceanic island; and this is still more doubtful with respect to the Andaman and Salomon groups.