536 



NA TURE 



\April%, 18S0 



have also the settlements of Pollok and Cota Batu in liana Bay. 

 The whole of the above-named places are in regular steam- 

 communication with Manila. 



2. In the map of the Malay Archipelago the geography of the 

 north-west coast of Borneo is so inaccurate as to be quite valueless. 

 The great Rejang River should run to near the head of the Koti, 

 and therefore the Sarawak Territory be prolonged much further 

 eastwards. The Limbang is brought down far into the Sarawak 

 territory ; and the Baram, a river nearly as large as the Rejang 

 (up which I have myself steamed 200 miles), is entirely omitted. 

 The Brunei Territory should extend as far as Marudu Bay. 

 All the old errors in nomenclature which have long been 

 corrected appear afresh. Considering Mr. Wallace's local 

 knowledge, it is surprising that he should have inserted a map of 

 Borneo which is quite the most inaccurate as regards the physical 

 geography of the island of any that have come under my notice. 



3. In the summary of the mammalian fauna of the Philippines 

 (p. 272) only three species of iusectivora are enumerated, the two 

 quite distinct species of Tupaia inhabiting Palawan and Mindanao 

 respectively being unnoticed. Speaking of the avifauna (p. 273), 

 Mr. Wallace mentions the absence of pheasants as one of its 

 negative characteristics— but he includes the Palawan group in 

 the Philippines, and this group has Pofypleetron. Mr. Wallace 

 also states that there are deer in Palawan. It would be interest- 

 ing to know on what authority this statement is made, for I 

 believe that Dr. Steere and myself are the only naturalists who 

 have visited Palawan, and to myself both Spaniards and natives 

 strenuously denied that any kind of deer existed on the island. 

 With regard to the observation that the Malayan indigenes have 

 more or less frizzled hair (p. 293), I may remark that the only 

 tribe with which I came in contact — the Tagbem'ia of Port Roy- 

 alist — were straight -haired. I inquired about a Negrito race, but 

 could hear nothing of any in that part of Palawan. The Spanish 

 capital of Palawan and residence of the Governor is Puerto 

 Princesa (Port Royalist of our charts), not the older settlement 

 of Taitay (p. 274). 



4. Tibang Mountain in Borneo (p. 349) is by common report 

 of the natives the source of the Rejang, Kapuas, Banjar-Masin, 

 and Koti rivers. It is said to have a while summit. The rhi- 

 noceros (p. 354) is by no means confined to the head of the 

 Koti river. It is quite common on the east coast of Borneo, in 

 the Kinabataiigan valley especially, and is found also in the 

 upper waters of the Kapuas and Rejang. Wild cattle can 

 hardly be said to be confined to the northern part of the island. 

 They abound in the Upper Rejang, are found on the shore near 

 Bintulu, and have been seen as far west as Batang Lupar. There 

 are possibly two species. They are certainly not the descendants 

 of S] ■a.nish cattle, though these exist, and they may have interbred 

 locally. At p. 356 Mr. Wallace writes : "The Dusun or Idaan 

 tribes— the Kanowits and Pakatans — correspond to the Land- 

 Dyal.s of Sarawak, while the [Milanows correspond to the Sea- 

 Dyaks." This is a most extraordinary statement. Dusuns, 

 Kanowits, and Land-Dyaks may correspond to one another— 

 though this has yet to be demonstrated— but there are as radical 

 differences in language, customs, and physical characters between 

 Milanows and Sea-Dyaks as between any two tribes in North- 

 west Borneo. Pakatan, by the way, should be written Bakatan 



- hill). 



5. 1 add a few notes on the Appendix. The Balow Dyaks 

 (p. 629) people the Lower Batang, Lupar, and Lingga rivers. 

 There are only a few immigrants in Simunjon. The Sea-Dyaks 

 of Borneo (p. 634) are clearly distinct from the Kayan tribes, 

 as much so as they are from Milanows, who are related to the 

 Kayans. The Sea-Dyaks have within the last thirty years 

 become the dominant race of North-west Borneo, but the Kayan 

 eem to be decaying. The correct spelling of Ilanun 

 (p. 637) is, I believe, lranun (cf. Maludu = Marudu). It is 

 worthy of note (p. 638) that the indigenes of Basilan style them- 

 selves Jakuns. The Idaan (p. 647) inhabit the vicinity of Kina 

 Balu, but the Muruts the Padas and Limbang rivers, with inter- 

 listricts inland. A. Hart Everett 



Papan, North Borneo 



Nicholson's Palaeontology, 2nd Edition, 1879 



May I ask the favour of your inserting in Nature the follow- 

 ing remarks on the second edition of Prof. Nicholson's "Manual 

 i. .ontology," which has but lately reached us in India. 



First of all, I desire to express my sense of the obligations 

 which are undoubtedly due by all palaeontologists to Prof. 

 Nich Is in for the a- in which he must haver 



in bringing together such an amount of facts as are contained in 

 the work before us. Such a labour can be only fully appreciated 

 by tho.-e who have experienced the difficulty of keeping pace 

 with the discoveries even in one branch of the subject. 



In a work like the "Manual" there must, almost inevitably, 

 be many sins of omission, and some of commission, and it is 

 accordingly with a full sense of the difficulties of Prof. Nichol- 

 son's task before me that I venture to point out certain errors 

 and omissions in the part devoted to the palaeontology of the 

 vertebrata, and more especially in regard to India. 



In his preface Prof. Nicholson observes that the greater part 

 of the work was written in the early part of the year 1S7S, and 

 consequently that his readers must not expect to find notices of 

 discoveries made after that date. No one can, of course, take 

 exception to that statement, but there are to be found in the text 

 numerous omissions not covered by this saving clause, as w ill be 

 seen from the following instances : — 



The first point I have to notice is in relation to the Siwalik 

 rocks of India. It was surely due to Prof. Nicholson's readers 

 to know that those who had most recently studied the newer 

 tertiaries of India were of opinion that the Siwaliks are in great 

 part of pliocene, and the Narbuda rocks of pleistocene, age. 

 Whenever Prof. Nicholson alludes to the latter, they are termed 

 pliocene, while the former, except in two places, are termed 

 upper miocene. I may add that these newer views as to the age 

 of the rocks in question were published in India as far back as 

 1S76. 



Again, whenever any reference is made to the Siwalik fauna, 

 no notice is taken of any of the additions made to it since 

 Falconer's time, though many of them were published before 

 1S78. 



The succeeding remarks bear reference to some of the more 

 striking of the omissions and errors occurring in the part of the 

 work under consideration (vol. ii.). 



p. ijg, — When treating of the Lepitosteids no mention is made 

 of the occurrence of several genera of this group in the Gondwana 

 rocks of India, and of their being possibly older than their 

 European representatives. 



P. 169.— It would surely have been well to have made mention 

 of the occurrence of three species of Ceratodus in the probably 

 triassic rocks of India. 



P. 209.— The Indian genus Parasuchus (as yet undesenbed) 

 ought to have been referred to, when mentioning the division 

 Parasuchia, of which it is the type. 



P. 222.— We find the sentence, " Dicynodon and Oitdenodon 

 are known only from strata of supposed triassic age in India and 

 South Africa." The inference from the above would be that 

 both genera occur in India, whereas the former only has been 

 found there. 



P. 256. — " In the miocene and pliocene tertiary we have no 

 remains of Cursores to notice." StrutAio asiatiais of Milne 

 Edwards is ignored. 



p. 300. — No mention is made of any fossil species of /Hants, 

 though one was described from India in 1876. 



p. 324,— \V e again meet with the old statement as to the 

 " hexaprotodont " character of Rhinoceros Hvalensis, although it 

 was shown in 1S76 that there was no ground on which such 

 statement could be supported. 



p. 346, — No mention is made of the Siwalik species of Sus, 

 nor of the peculiar Siwalik genus Hippoh)ii$. The well-known 

 and w idely-distributed genus Listriodon is not mentioned in the 

 book. The very peculiar genus Tetraconodon (described in 

 1S76) is also omitted. 



P_ 348.— The genus Anthracotherium is stated to be exclu- 

 sively European, no mention being made of the Indian species 

 described in the "Records of the Geological Survey of India 

 fur May, 1877. . . 



p 340 —Hyopotamus is stated to occur only 111 the eocene and 

 lower miocene ; the Sind species, described in the above-quoted 

 paper, being unnoticed. 



Pp. 379-S0.— The dentition of the elephant seems to be a 

 source of stumbling to Trof. Nicholson. He observes :" The 

 first three teeth of the grinder series, which would ordinarily 

 represent premolars, are supposed to be milk-molars, as they 

 have no predecessors or successors." If any inference could be 

 drawn from the above, it would be that the teeth in question 

 . e-e true molars ; it is on quite different grounds that these 

 teeth are classed as milk-molars. In the next sentence we find : 

 ■'Nunc of the molars, in fact, undergo vertical displacement, 

 and immediately afterwards it is stated that premolars occur in 



