24 THE MALAY ARCHIPELAGO. [chap. i. 



climatal divisions of the surface. The great volcanic 

 chain runs through both parts, and appears to produce no 

 effect in assimilating their productions. Borneo closely 

 resembles New Guinea not only in its vast size and its 

 freedom from volcanoes, but in its variety of geological 

 structure, its uniformity of climate, and the general aspect 

 of the forest vegetation that clothes its surface. The 

 Moluccas are the counterpart of the Philippines in their 

 volcanic structure, their extreme fertility, their luxuriant 

 forests, and their frequent earthquakes ; and Bali with the 

 east end of Java has a climate almost as dry and a soil 

 almost as arid as that of Timor. Yet between these cor- 

 responding groups of islands, constructed as it were after 

 the same pattern, subjected to the same climate, and 

 bathed by the same oceans, there exists the greatest pos- 

 sible contrast when we compare their animal productions. 

 Nowhere does the ancient doctrine — that differences or 

 similarities in the various forms of life that inhabit dif- 

 ferent countries are due to corresponding physical dif- 

 ferences or similarities in the countries themselves — meet 

 with so direct and palpable a contradiction. Borneo and 

 New Guinea, as alike physically as two distinct countries 

 can be, are zoologically wide as the poles asunder ; while 

 Australia, with its dry winds, its open plains, its stony 

 deserts, and its temperate climate, yet produces birds and 

 quadrupeds which are closely related to those inhabiting 



