The Banda Islands and the Bandan Birds 1 7 



dominions of the King of Portugal. He had done this at 

 Aga^ai and in Amboyna also. 



The return voyage to Malacca was marked by disaster. A 

 junk, which now was bought to replace the Indian vessel, was 

 wrecked, and the crew, who had taken refuge on a small island, 

 was attacked by pirates. The pirates, however, were worsted and 

 their craft was captured. Serrao, who had been in command of 

 the junk, sailed in the pirate vessel to Amboyna, and thence 

 eventually reached Ternate, where he remained at the invitation 

 of Boleife, the Sultan of that island. The junk, of which Ismael 

 was the skipper, was also wrecked near Tuban, but the cargo, 

 consisting of cloves, was recovered in 1513 from the Javans, who 

 had taken possession of it. 



Zoologically the Banda Islands lie within Wallace's Australian 

 Region, and their avifauna has a great affinity with that of 

 Australia. Wallace visited these islands in December 1857, 

 May 1859, and April 1861, and collected eight species of birds, 

 namely, Rhipidura squamata^ a fan-tailed Flycatcher ; Pachycephala 

 ph^eonota^ a thickhead ; Myzomela boiei^ a small scarlet-headed 

 honey-eater ; Zosterops chloriSy a white-eye ; Pitta vigorsi, one of 

 the brightly-coloured ground thrushes of the Malayan region; 

 Halcyon Moris j a kingfisher with a somewhat extensive range ; 

 Ptilopus xanthogabter^ a fruit-eating pigeon, and the nutmeg 

 pigeon, Carpophaga concinna. The islands were visited by the 

 members of the Challenger expedition in September and October, 

 1874, but the only additional species then obtained was Monarcha 

 cinerascenSy also a Flycatcher. 



These birds may be regarded as the resident birds of the 

 Banda Islands, but there are others which are occasional visitants 

 or migrants. Indeed, in seas so full of islands, it is inevitable that 

 wanderers from other islands should occasionally visit the group. 



D 



