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THE BIRDS OF THE KANGEAN ISLANDS. 

 BY ERNST HARTERT. 



(Plate XIII.) 



THE Kangean Islands are a small group of islands north of Bali and due east 

 of Madura. While they are connected with Madura, a large island north of 

 and close to Java, and with the same fauna as the latter island, through submarine 

 shallows and the islands of Raiis and 8aiiudi, there is deep sea of 300 to 700 fathoms 

 or more between the Kangeans and Bali, and the sea towards Celebes is apparently 

 equally deep. The Kangeans are of lime- and sandstone formation, like Madura, 

 and some coral rocks.* Mr. Prillwitz says the whole big island of Kangean is 

 hilly, and gives one the impression of elevated sea-giound with coral-rock on the 

 hills. The island is very fertile and thickly wooded, though there is very little fresh 

 water, some villages on the hills being an hour away from any fresh water. To 

 "Kangean" (i.e. "place of exile") the sultans of Sumenep (.Madura) used to send 

 criminals and other subjects fallen into disgrace. The natives were in former years 

 pirates, and e\en now the}' are warlike, troublesome, and great thieves ; and they 

 are also much less clean than the Javanese, and many sutfer from a sort of scurf 

 on the skin. Mr. Prillwitz was warned not to enter the interior; but, with the 

 exception of some cigars stolen from him, he was not troubled by the inhabitants, 

 though in the eastern portion of the island even the oldest men did not remember 

 that a European had ever visited their villages, nor had natives ever been there 

 bird-hunting. Unfortunately, however, the climate does not seem to be good, as 

 Mr. Prillwitz had a slight attack of fever, and his two best native hunters fell ill, 

 one of them very dangerously. 



With the exception of Dr. A. G. Vorderman, who visited Kangean in 1892, 

 nobody has ever thought of exploring the ornis of this little group ; therefore the 

 ornithological literature is confined to the one article, " Bijdrage tot de kennis 

 der ^'ogels van den Kangean-Archipel," in Nafuurk. Tijdschriff. voor Nerlerlandsch- 

 Indii: LI I (189o), and a note by Dr. Finsch on the Treron in Notes of the Leyden 

 Museum XXII (1900) p. 162. 



Seeing from Dr. A'orderman's work how very interesting the Kangean ornis is, 

 we urged our correspondent Mr. Ernst Prillwitz, in Java, to collect on Kangean ; 

 and it is evident that his collection is a fairly complete one, and gives a sufficiently 

 good idea of the avifauna of the group. Not only did he obtain all the new forms 

 discovered by Vorderman, but added largely to the number of birds known to occur 

 on Kangean. Together with those mentioned from the detached islands of Sej>andjang 

 and Sepeken, \'orderman knew 44 species; while now, through Prillwitz's exertions, 

 we are acquainted with 78 altogether. 



Mr. Prillwitz says that he was struck with the small number of species of small 

 birds, the scarcity of woodpeckers, the absence of peacocks and hornbills, as well as 



* Dr. Vorderman calls the Kangean group the rest of the most south-easterlj- itromontorj of the 

 former Malayo-Asiatic continent. 



