The Malay archipelago : the land of the orang-utan ... - Wallace Online

308 THE MALAY ARCHIPELAGO. [chap.a male, with very long and curious antennte, and elegant blackand white markings. It is found on fallen trunks in Batchian.5. An undescribed species of Arachnobas, a curious genus ofweevils peculiar to the Moluccas and New Guinea, and remarkablefor their long legs, and their habit of often sitting on leaves,and turning raj^idly round the edge to the under-surface whendisturbed. It was found in Gilolo. All these insects are representedof the natural size.Like the birds, the insects of the Moluccas show a decidedaffinity with those of New Guinea rather tlian with the productionsof the great western islands of the Archipelago, butthe difference in form and structure between the jiroductions ofthe east and west is not nearly so marked here as in birds.Tliis is probably due to the more immediate dependence ofinsects ou climate and vegetation, and the greater facilities fortheir distribution in the varied stages of egg, pupa, and perfectinsect. This has led to a general uniformity in the insept-lifeof the whole Archipelago, in accoixlance with the general uniformityof its climate and vegetation ; while on tlie other handthe great susceptibility of the insect organization to tlie actionof external conditions has led to infinite detailed modificationsof form and colour, which have in many cases given a considerablediversity to the pi'oductions of adjacent islands.Owing to the great preponderance among the birds of parrots,pigeons, kingfishers, and sunbirds, almost all of gay or delicatecolours and many adorned with the most gorgeous plumage,and to the numbers of very lai'ge and showy butterflies whichare almost everywhere to be met with, the forests of theMoluccas offer to the naturalist a very striking example of theluxuriance and beauty of animal life in the tropics. Yet thealmost entire absence of Mammalia, and of such widespreadgroups of birds as woodpeckers, thrushes, jays, tits, andpheasants, must convince him that he is in a part of the worldwhich has in reality but little in common with the greatAsiatic continent, although an unbroken chain of islands seemto link them to it.CHAPTER XXVIII.MACASSAE TO THE ARU ISLANDS IN A NATIVE PEAU.(DECEMBER 1856.)It was the beginning of December, and the rainy season atMacassar had just set in. For nearly three months I had beheldthe sun rise daily above the palm-groves, mount to the zenith,and descend like a globe of tire into the ocean, unobscured fora single moment of his course : now dark leaden clouds had