310 
SIR RODERICK I. MURCHISON’S ADDRESS. [May 24, 1858. 
at twenty millions, of whom no fewer than seventeen are in the 
volcanic region. Java alone, abounding in volcanic rocks, contains 
ten millions, or one half the population of the entire Archipelago. 
The two little volcanic islands of Bali and Lomboc, of which the 
united area is but 3,300 square miles, have a computed population of 
1,250,000, which is probably equal to that of non-volcanic Borneo, 
of eighty times their extent ! 
On the subject of the vast country which has thus been sketched, 
three papers have, as already stated, been read before the Society. 
The first of these, in importance, is that of Mr. A. B. Wallace, on 
the Arru, or Aroe Islands. This singular group lies towards the 
eastern extremity of the Malayan portion of the Archipelago, and 
is but 200 miles from the south-western coast of the great island 
of New Guinea, a comparatively shallow channel lying between. 
They are low islands, for the most part covered with forest, the 
larger being seven in number, and divided from each other by such 
narrow channels, that, but for the saltness of the water, the voyager 
might fancy himself in an ordinary navigable river. 
The inhabitants are a quasi-negro people, but now considerably 
intermixed with Malays, J avanese, and natives of Celebes ; some 
converted to the Christian, some to the Mahomedan religion, but 
some also continuing heathens. Of all the Oriental Negroes they are 
the most docile and industrious ; being made so by their trading inter- 
course with strangers. Their sterile land will yield no human food 
except maize and yams, and they receive their rice from the more 
western islands of the Archipelago. An extensive bank, on the 
eastern side of the group, is productive in the mother-of-pearl oyster, 
in an inferior kind of pearl oyster, in the tripang, or holothurion, and 
in the shell tortoise ; and the fishing of these is the chief employment 
of the natives. The Aroes are an emporium to which the western 
traders resort for the commodities now enumerated ; while the 
islands themselves yield most of the birds of paradise, and the various 
parrots which, under the Malayan names, somewhat corrupted, of 
Lories and Cockatoos, are esteemed by distant nations. 
The similarity or identity of the plants and animals of the Aroe 
group, man included, with the comparative narrowness and shallow- 
ness of the sea between them and New Guinea, has induced Mr. 
Wallace to come to the conclusion, that these smaller islands once 
formed part of the continental island. This is a matter which 
this enterprising traveller and accomplished naturalist will be 
better able to reason upon when he visits New Guinea, as he 
proposes. 
