146 The National Geographic Magazine 



thus enumerated by him was 3,141, and 

 are listed in tables ; of these 1,668 were 

 listed by name, while 1,473 are > so ^ ar 

 as known, without names. The num- 

 ber found is nearly twice as great as 

 heretofore known ; as more accurate 

 charts of the archipelago are made, it is 

 believed the number will be increased. 



AREA OF THE ISLANDS 



The total area of the islands is 1 1 5,026 

 square miles. There are two islands 

 with areas exceeding 10,000 square 

 miles each, namely, Luzon with 40,969 

 and Mindanao with 36,292. There are 

 9 islands each of which has an area of 

 more than 1,000 square miles and less 

 than 10,000. There are 20 between 100 

 and 1,000 square miles, 73 between 10 

 and 100 square miles, and 262 between 

 1 and 10 square miles. The remaining 

 number, 2,775, or seven-eighths of all, 

 have areas less than a square mile each. 



VERY FEW MAMMALIA 



The fauna most closely resembles that 

 of the neighboring Malayan Islands, but 

 at the same time shows certain remark- 

 able differences from them. Thus there 

 are very few mammalia in comparison 

 with the number in Borneo and Java. 

 There are but two species of monkeys, 

 but three representatives of the car- 

 nivora, and of the deer tribe but six spe- 

 cies. Small rodents are very scarce 

 except in the large seaports, while, on 

 the other hand, there are at least 30 spe- 

 cies of bats. There are no large mam- 

 malia except the carabao, a few of which 

 are still found wild, and the timarau or 

 antelope buffalo of Mindoro. Altogether 

 there are but 23 species of terrestrial 

 mammals known on the islands. 



Not only does the fauna of the Phil- 

 ippine Islands differ in certain marked 

 respects from that of the adjacent islands 

 of the East India archipelago, but the 

 different islands of the Philippines differ 

 among themselves in their fauna. The 

 timarau is found only in Mindoro, por- 



cupines are found only in Paragua and 

 in the Calamianes Islands, and there are 

 numerous species of animals which have 

 been found only in certain parts of the 

 archipelago. 



GREAT VARIETY OF BIRDS 



Such peculiarities of distribution of 

 land animals may be explained easily, 

 but it is not so easy to explain similar 

 facts concerning the distribution of 

 birds. Paragua and the Calamianes Isl- 

 ands possess several species which are 

 not found elsewhere in the archipelago, 

 but which are similar to species found in 

 Borneo. Of the 286 species of birds 

 found in Luzon 5 1 at least are not known 

 to occur outside of that island. The avi- 

 fauna of Samar and Leyte contains 22 

 species not found elsewhere, and simi- 

 larly in Mindanao and Basilan are found 

 1 7 species peculiar to those islands. One 

 of the most striking cases, however, is 

 that of Cebu, which, although a near 

 neighbor to Negros on one side and Bo- 

 hol on the other, contains 9 species of 

 birds not found elsewhere. The total 

 number of species of land birds known 

 is a little over 300, a larger number than 

 in Java ; of these many are game birds, 

 such as snipe, plover, quail, duck, and 

 geese. In spite of this richness of spe- 

 cies there are many important genera 

 found in the other Malay Islands which 

 are not represented here, while on the 

 other hand more than two-thirds of the 

 Philippine species are peculiar to that 

 group of islands. These facts strongly 

 emphasize the isolation of the archipel- 

 ago. 



THE FORESTS 



The forests of the archipelago are of 

 wide extent and embrace a great variety 

 of woods, many of them highly valuable. 

 Woods suitable for the finest cabinet- 

 work, for veneering, and for artistic pur- 

 poses, and also woods adapted to ship or 

 house building and other economic uses, 

 are found in great abundance. There 



