CHAPTER IX. NATURAL HISTORY OF
THE INDO-MALAY ISLANDS.
IN the first CHAPTER of this work I have stated generally the reasons which
lead us to conclude that the large islands in the western portion of the
Archipelago—Java, Sumatra, and Borneo—as well as the Malay peninsula and
the Philippine islands, have been recently separated from the continent of Asia. I
now propose to give a sketch of the Natural History of these, which I term the
Indo-Malay islands, and to show how far it supports this view, and how much
information it is able to give us of the antiquity and origin of the separate
islands.
The flora of the Archipelago is at present so imperfectly known, and I have
myself paid so little attention to it, that I cannot draw from it many facts of
importance. The Malayan type of vegetation is however a very important one;
and Dr. Hooker informs us, in his "Flora Indica," that it spreads over all the
moister and more equable parts of India, and that many plants found in Ceylon,
the Himalayas, the Nilghiri, and Khasia mountains are identical with those of
Java and the Malay peninsula. Among the more characteristic forms of this flora
are the rattans—climbing palms of the genus Calamus, and a great variety of tall,
as well as stemless palms. Orchids, Araceae, Zingiberaceae and ferns, are
especially abundant, and the genus Grammatophyllum—a gigantic epiphytal
orchid, whose clusters of leaves and flower-stems are ten or twelve feet long—is
peculiar to it. Here, too, is the domain of the wonderful pitcher plants
(Nepenthaceae), which are only represented elsewhere by solitary species in
Ceylon, Madagascar, the Seychelles, Celebes, and the Moluccas. Those
celebrated fruits, the Mangosteen and the Durian, are natives of this region, and
will hardly grow out of the Archipelago. The mountain plants of Java have
already been alluded to as showing a former connexion with the continent of
Asia; and a still more extraordinary and more ancient connection with Australia
has been indicated by Mr. Low's collections from the summit of Kini-balou, the
loftiest mountain in Borneo.
Plants have much greater facilities for passing across arms of the sea than
animals. The lighter seeds are easily carried by the winds, and many of them are
specially adapted to be so carried. Others can float a long time unhurt in the