16 The Malay Archipelago. 



compact in shape, is probably larger than Borneo. Sumatra 

 is about equal in extent to Great Britain ; Java, Luzon, and 

 Celebes are each about the size of Ireland. Eighteen more 

 islands are, on the average, as large as Jamaica ; more than a 

 hundred are as large as the Isle of Wight ; while the isles and 

 islets of smaller size are innumerable. The absolute extent of 

 land in the Archipelago is not greater than that contained by- 

 Western Europe from Hungary to Spain ; but, owing to the 

 manner in which the land is broken up and divided, the varie- 

 ty of its productions is rather in proportion to the immense 

 surface over which the islands are spread, than to the quantity 

 of land which they contain. 



Geological Contrasts. — One of the chief volcanic belts upon 

 the globe passes through the Archipelago, and produces a 

 striking contrast in the scenery of the volcanic and non- volcan- 

 ic islands. A curving line, marked out by scores of active 

 and hundreds of extinct volcanoes, may be traced through the 

 whole length of Sumatra and Java, and thence by the islands 

 of Bali, Lombock, Sumbawa^ Flores, the Serwatty Islands, 

 Banda, Amboyna, Batchian, Makian, Tidore, Ternate, and Gi- 

 lolo, to Morty Island. Here there is a slight but well-marked 

 break, or shift, of about 200 miles to the westward, where the 

 volcanic belt again begins, in North Celebes, and passes by Siau 

 and Sanguir to the Philippine Islands, along the eastern side of 

 which it continues, in a curving line, to their northern extremity. 

 From the extreme eastern bend of this belt at Banda, we pass 

 onward for 1000 miles over a non-volcanic district to the vol- 

 canoes observed by Dampier, in 1699, on the north-eastern 

 coast of New Guinea, and can there trace another volcanic 

 belt, through New Britain, New Ireland, and the Solomon Isl- 

 ands, to the eastern limits of the Archipelago. 



In the whole region occupied by this vast line of volcanoes, 

 and for a considerable breadth on each side of it, earthquakes 

 are of continual recurrence, slight shocks being felt at inter- 

 vals of every few weeks or months, while more severe ones, 

 shaking down whole villages, and doing more or less injury 

 to life and property, are sure to happen, in one part or anoth- 

 er of this district, almost every year. In many of the islands 

 the years of the great earthquakes form the chronological 

 epochs of the native inhabitants, by the aid of which the ages 



