GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION 361 



Feathers, viii. pp. 37-72, 151-163 ; ix. pp. 107-132) and the personal 

 experience of Captain Kelham {Ibis, 1881, pp. 362-395, 501-532; 

 1882, pp. 1-18, 185-204) have investigated. Of Perak and the 

 adjoining district Dr. Sharpe has rendered an account of some 

 collections made there {Proc. Zool. Soc. 1886, pp. 350-353; 1887, 

 pp. 431-443), and Herr Hartert has recorded his impressions {Journ. 

 fur Orn. 1889, pp. 379-407); while Herr August Miiller has very 

 fully recounted researches in the island of Salanga {op. cit. 1882, 

 pp. 354-448). The result arrived at by the first of these gentle- 

 men shews a considerable amount of peculiarity in the Avifauna, 

 since of the 459 species which he finally accepted, 115 (or just 

 over one -fourth) had not been observed elsewhere in British 

 India or its dependencies, but it is doubtless true, as the second 

 of them remarks, that the rest of it has much in common with 

 India and Ceylon, though the eastern slopes of the peninsula 

 shew a strong relationship to Borneo, the Malay Archipelago, 

 and even China. 



The Philippine Islands for more than a century have supplied 

 ornithologists with materials for study, but the first attempt to 

 compile a list of their Bii-ds, made by Prof, von Martens (Journ. fur 

 Orn. 1866, pp. 5-31) was manifestly imperfect. In 1875 appeared 

 what was for the time a careful account of their Avifauna by the 

 late Lord Tweeddale, then known as Lord Walden (Trans. Zool. 

 Soc. ix. pp. 125-252), which he shewed to have a great amount 

 of peculiarity. Yet so much has since been done that his results 

 cannot be now accepted, especially as Palawan and the Sooloos — 

 islands which connect the Philippines Avith Borneo — were then 

 unexplored. To him is probably due the interest in the subject 

 almost ever since kept up, and indeed he contributed a long series 

 of papers upon it,^ which after his death was continued by his 

 nephew and ornithological heir. Captain Wardlaw-Eamsay,^ while 

 Dr. Sharpe has contributed nearly as many more,^ and the recent 

 investigations in Palawan of Dr. Platen recorded by Prof. W. 

 Blasius,* and of Dr. Steere, the final results of which last have not 

 yet appeared, shew that the subject is not exhausted. Until this 

 mass of information has been digested by a comipetent ornithologist 

 it Avill be obvious that no useful end can be attained by attempting 

 a summary here. Perhaps the chief thing to note is the presence 

 here of a Megapode, Megapodius cumingi, as it is the most northern 

 locality for any member of the Family, and indeed it was in the 



1 Proc. Zool. Soc. 1878, pp. 106-114, 280-288, 339-346, 379-381, 429, 430, 

 611-624, 708-712, 936-954 ; 1879, pp. 68-73. 



2 Ibis, 1884, pp. 330-335 ; 1886, pp. 155-162. 



3 Trans. Linn. Soc. (2) i. pp. 307-355; Ibis, 1884, pp. 316-322 ; 1888, pp. 

 193-204, 383-396 ; Proc. Zool. Soc. 1888, pp. 268-281. 



■^ Ornis, 1888, pp. 301-320. 



