20 The Malay Archipelago. 



as exists in the other islands, and this character extends in a 

 lesser degree to Plores, Sumbawa, Lombock, and Bali. 



In Timor the most common trees are Eucalypti of several 

 species, so characteristic of Australia, with sandal-wood, acacia, 

 and other sorts in less abundance. These are scattei'ed over 

 the country more or less thickly, but never so as to deserve 

 the name of a forest. Coarse and scanty grasses grow be- 

 neath them on the more barren hills, and a luxuriant herbage 

 in the moister localities. In the islands between Timor and 

 Java there is often a more thickly-wooded countiy, abounding 

 in thorny and prickly trees. These seldom reach any great 

 height, and during the force of the dry season they almost 

 completely lose their leaves, allowing the ground beneath them 

 to be parched up, and contrasting strongly with the damp, 

 gloomy, ever-verdant forests of the other islands. This pecul- 

 iar character, which extends in a less degree to the southern 

 peninsula of Celebes and the east end of Java, is most probably 

 owing to the proximity of Australia. The south-east mon- 

 soon, which lasts for about two- thirds of the year (from March 

 to November), blowing over the northern parts of that coun- 

 try, produces a degree of heat and dryness which assimilates 

 the vegetation and physical aspect of the adjacent islands to 

 its own. A little further eastward, in Timor-laut and the Ke 

 Islands, a moister climate prevails, the south-east winds blow- 

 ing from the Pacific through Torres Straits and over the damp 

 forests of New Guinea, and as a consequence every rocky islet 

 is clothed with verdure to its very summit. Further west 

 again, as the same dry winds blow over a wider and wider 

 extent of ocean, they have time to absorb fresh moisture, and 

 we accordingly find the island of Java possessing a less and 

 less arid climate, till in the extreme west near Batavia rain 

 occurs more or less all the year round, and the moiintains are 

 everywhere clothed with forests of unexampled luxuriance. 



Contrasts in Depth of Sea. — It was first pointed out by 

 Mr. George Windsor Earl, in a paper read before the Royal 

 Geographical Society in 1845, and subsequently in a pamphlet 

 " On the Physical Geography of South-eastern Asia and Aus- 

 tralia," dated 1855, that a shallow sea connected the great isl- 

 ands of Sumatra, Java, and Borneo with the Asiatic continent, 

 with which their natural productions generally agreed ; while 



