Note 19 — Chapter III

One of the difficulties felt by all students of geographical distribution arises from the imperfect or careless indications given both in books and in herbaria, and this is more felt in regard to South America than as to any other part of the world. A very large proportion of the earlier collections bear simply the label “Brazil,” forgetting that the area is as great as that of Europe. In other cases local names of places, not to be found on maps or in gazetteers, embarrass the student and weary his patience. It is mainly from Darwin that naturalists have learned that geographical distribution is the chief key to the past history of the earth.