14 
COMPENDIUM OF GEOGRAPHY AND TRAVEL 
to an abrupt termination at the little island of Bali, east 
of Java, there being a channel of great depth, though very 
narrow, between it and the adjacent island of Lombok. 
The same deep channel is continued northwards through 
the Straits of Macassar to the Celebes Sea, where it 
divides, one arm passing between the islands of Mindanao 
and northern Celebes into the Pacific Ocean, and the other 
north-westward, between Sibutu and Tawi-tawi islands 
into the Sulu Sea. Hence one-half only of what is some¬ 
times called the East Indian Archipelago, and included 
in Asia, is really connected with that continent. The 
eastern half is essentially Australian, not only as regards 
the history of its origin, but also in its fauna and 
flora. Even ethnically this extensive insular system 
belongs to two clearly distinct peoples—the Malay and 
the Papuan—so that the current expression “ Malay 
Archipelago,” here adopted, is deficient in thorough 
accuracy. The line dividing the two races lies, however, 
considerably to the east of that which separates the two 
zoological regions, the Malays extending to Celebes, Sum- 
bawa, and most of the islands of the Moluccas. 
But, while conforming to the hitherto received custom 
of arbitrarily including under one appellation the whole 
of the archipelago as far as the Moluccas and Timor, we 
may still recognise it to be composed of several distinct 
groups. These groups are—in the north the Philippines, 
followed to the south by the Moluccas, and by the very 
remarkable and zoologically distinct island, Celebes. 
Finally, to the south and to the west are the Lesser and 
the Greater Sunda Archipelagoes, by the latter of which 
are understood the three large islands of Sumatra, Java, 
and Borneo. 
All these groups—of which Sumatra, Java, and Borneo 
belonged in recent geological times to the Asiatic continent 
