232 NATURAL HISTORY OF THE [chap. ix. 



but which do not occur in Borneo or Sumatra. Amoug 

 Mammals the Ehinoceros javanicus is the most striking 

 example, for a distinct species is found in Borneo and 

 Sumatra, while the Javanese species occurs in Birmah and 

 even in Bengal. Among birds, the small ground dove, 

 Geopelia striata, and the curious bronze-coloured magpie, 

 Crypsirhina varians, are common to Java and Siam; while 

 there are in Java species of Pteruthius, Arrenga. Myio- 

 phonus, Zoothera, Sturnopastor, and Estrelda, ■'the nearest 

 allies of which are found in various parts of India, while 

 nothing like them is known to inhabit Borneo or Sumatra. 

 Such a curious phenomenon as this can only be under- 

 stood, by supposing that, subsequent to the separation 

 of Java, Borneo became almost entirely submerged, and 

 on its re- elevation was for a time connected with the 

 Malay peninsula and Sumatra, but not with Java or 

 Siam. Any geologist who knows how strata have been 

 contorted and tilted up, and how elevations and depres- 

 sions must often have occurred alternately, not once or 

 twice only, but scores and even hundreds of times, will 

 have no difficulty in admitting that such changes as have 

 been here indicated are not in themselves improbable. The 

 existence of extensive coal-beds in Borneo and Sumatra, of 

 such recent origin that the leaves which abound hi their 

 shales are scarcely distinguishable from those of the forests 

 which now cover the country, proves that such changes of 



