22 Mr. A. H. Everett on the 



Immediately to the north of Balabac is tlie North Balabac 

 Strait, separating the island from the S.W. extremity of 

 Palawan. This strait differs from the southern passage in 

 its comparatively smaller breadth; in the fact that the depth 

 of the sea throughout it is under 50 fathoms; and in its 

 being studded by numerous islets, of which the principal 

 ones are Bancalan, Mantangule, Canabungan, Candaraman, 

 Pandannan, and Bugsuk. As all these islets are of recent 

 coral formation and flat, while the S.W. end of Palawan is 

 low and shelving, the strait must have been, at no very 

 distant date, of considerably greater width and clear of islets, 

 and the geographical connection of Balabac with Palawan 

 would not have been so close as it is now *. 



The zoology of Balabac remained wholly unknown until 

 Dr. J. B. Steere visited it in 1874, when he stayed a month 

 on the island and made a small collection of mammals and 

 birds, obtaining or recording altogether twelve species of the 

 latter. Subsequently, in his ' List of the Birds and Mammals 

 of the Steere Expedition ' (published at Ann Arbor in 1890), 

 Dr. Steere added eight more species, thus bringing the total 

 number of birds recorded from Balabac up to twenty species. 

 Scanty as this record was, the presence of such species as 

 Cittoc'mcla nigra, Criniger f rater, Farus amahilis, jEthojiyga 

 shelleiji, and Dryococcyx harringtoni caused it to be a fore- 

 gone conclusion that the avifauna would pi'ove to be identical, 

 or nearly so, with that of Palawan ; and the acquisition of 

 further material by the present writer, raising the number 

 of known species to a total of sixty-eight, has failed to 

 produce a single form that has not already been found 

 or does not almost certainly exist in Palawan. The only 

 salient difference between the two islands so far appears to 

 be in the absence of Tolyplectron nehrkorn<s from Balabac, 

 and perhaps there are other deficiencies, which may serve to 

 indicate a certain degree of individuality in its ornis. 



* This account of Balabac is partlj^ compiled from the China Sea 

 Directory. A map of the Balabac-Palawan Group will be found in Proc. 

 Zool. Sec. 1889, p. 220. 



