PEE FACE. 



account of the less-known lands and islands in which our time was 

 chiefly spent. " It is the fate of most voyagers no sooner to dis- 

 cover what is most interesting in any locahty than they are hurried 

 from it," Darwin tells us ; and the sentiment often found an echo 

 in our own minds when, as from various causes occasionally 

 hapjjened, our stay at some of these places was but short. This 

 was especially the case with regard to the Liu-kiu Islands — a most 

 interesting group which run the risk of being left unexplored by 

 Europeans until the wave of Japanese civilisation has swept every 

 particle of its originality from the country. For this reason, in an 

 Appendix to Vol. I., I have incorporated such of our own notes as 

 are of less general interest with those of former travellers in order 

 to bring together the chief facts known of these islands. For their 

 history I am indebted almost entirely to the account of Pere 

 Gaubil, the Jesuit, in the well-known " Lettres Edifiantes et 

 Curieuses." 



The history of Kamschatka appeared to me to be sufficiently 

 interesting, and sufficiently little known to be worthy of a slight 

 sketch in a separate chapter. 



With regard to the Marcliescts cruise in the Eastern Archipelago 

 I had to contend with the fact that, in many places, that master 

 naturahst, Mr. A. E. Wallace, had preceded us. Nothing could be 

 more fortunate for a traveller, nothing more disadvantageous to an 

 author. The " Malay Archipelago " may still be used as the guide- 

 book for those beautiful islands, for they have been almost un- 

 touched by the great changes which Europe has witnessed during 

 the last quarter century, and I have but little to add to or take 

 from the descriptior.s of one far more fitted to treat of them than 

 myself. 



Our stay in the Sulu Islands extended over a period of about 

 six weeks. ]\Ir. Burbidge's examination of the flora of the gToup,^ 

 together with our collections of its fauna, show that the archipelago 

 is not zoographically separable from the Philippines. Westwards 



1 "The Gardens of the Sun," F. W. Burbidge, p. 343. 



