CHAP. XVII BORNEO AND JAYA 377 



SO much of the once connecting land is covered with water, 

 that the amount of speciality is hardly, if at all, greater 

 than occurs in many continental areas of equal extent and 

 remoteness. This will be more evident if we consider that 

 Borneo is as large as the Indo-Chinese Peninsula, or as the 

 Indian Peninsula south of Bombay, and if either of these 

 countries were sej^arated from the continent by the 

 submergence of the whole area north of them as far as the 

 Himalayas, they would be found to contain quite as many 

 peculiar genera and species as Borneo actually does now. 

 A more decisive test of the lapse of time since the 

 separation took place is to be found in the presence of a 

 number of representative species closely allied to those of 

 the surrounding countries, such as the tailed monkeys and 

 the numerous squirrels. These relationships, however, are 

 best seen among the birds, which have been more 

 thoroughly collected and more carefully studied than the 

 mammalia. 



Birds. — About 580 species of birds are now known to 

 inhabit Borneo, of which 420 species are land-birds.^ One 

 hundred and eight species are supposed to be peculiar to 

 the island, and of these one half have been noted, either by 

 Count Salvadori or Mr. Everett, as being either representa- 

 tive species of, or closely allied to birds inhabiting other 

 islands or countries. The majority of these are, as might 

 be expected, allied to species inhabiting the surrounding 

 countries, especiall}^ Sumatra, the Malay Peninsula, or Java, 

 a smaller number having their representative forms in the 

 Philippine Islands or Celebes. But there is another grou23 

 of eight species whose nearest allies are found in such 

 remote lands as Ceylon, North India, Burma, or China. 

 These last have been indicated in the following list by a 

 double star (**) while those which are representative of 

 forms found in the immediately surrounding area, and are 

 in many cases very slightly differentiated from their allies, 

 are indicated by a single star (*). 



1 In the first edition of tliis work the numbers were 400 and 340, 

 showing the great increase of our knowledge during tlie last ten years, 

 chiefly owing to the researches of Mr. A. H. Everett in Sarawak and Mr. 

 John Whitehead in North Borneo and the great mountain Kini Iialu. 



