THE ETHIOPIAN REGION,
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.