52 



THE WORLD OF LIFE 



CHAP. 



a drawing of which forms the frontispiece of his volume. 

 It is about 40 feet high, the fruits hanging thickly from the 

 branches in strings 3 or 4 feet long, giving it a very remark- 

 able appearance. His general result is, that the flora is very 

 rich in peculiar species, but rather poor in peculiar genera. 



As this work is wholly in Dutch, I cannot give further 

 details, but having counted the species in each natural order 

 I will add a list of the ten largest orders for comparison with 

 others here given : — 



I will add a few words on a point of special interest to 

 myself. Having found that the birds and mammals of the 

 eastern half of the archipelago were almost wholly different 

 from those in the western half, and that the change occurred 

 abruptly on passing from Bali to Lombok, and from Borneo 

 to Celebes (as explained in chapter xiv. of my Malay- 

 Archipelago), the late Professor Huxley proposed that the 

 straits between them should be called " Wallace's Line," as it i 

 forms the boundary between the Oriental and Australian 

 regions. But later, as stated in my Island Life, I came to the 

 conclusion that Celebes was really an outlier of the Asiatic 

 continent, but separated at a much earlier date, and that 

 therefore Wallace's Line must be drawn east of Celebes and 

 the Philippines. 



The Flora of New Guinea 



Early botanical explorers in New Guinea were disap- 

 pointed by finding the flora to be rather poor and monotonous. 

 This was the case with Prof. O. Beccari, who collected on' 

 the north-west coast ; and Mr. H. O. Forbes, of the Liverpoo 

 Museum, informs me that he formed the same opinion sc 

 long as he had collected on the lowlands near the coast, bu 

 that on reaching a height of near 1000 feet a much riche 

 and quite novel flora was found. Prof. Beccari, who is a 

 this time studying the palms from various recent Dutch 

 British, and German collections, now thinks that the numbe 





