On two Mammals from the Calamianes-islands

The study of the geographical distribution of the Mammals over the islands of the Malayan Archipelago teaches us the fact that only a very small number of species is common to Sumatra and Borneo and at the same time to Java. The most interesting species among them is without question Mydaus meliceps, as it presents a most singular fact in its local distribution, as it is confined exclusively to high mountains and never seems to visit the plains ¹). It causes extensive injury to the plantations and it infects its vicinity by projecting a fetid matter of a very violent odour: two reasons why it is very hated by the inhabitants so that it never would come in any one’s head to bring the animal over from Sumatra to Borneo or Java, or vice versa. We must look upon it as if a relic from a former fauna, by submersion of the land perhaps, pushed towards the elevated countries, the mountains. Since more than seventy years the Teledoe, Seng-goeng Teleggo, or indigenous names for the animal, has been known from Java and Sumatra; the first specimen from Borneo, however, has been procured — as far as I am aware — by Mr. C. Bock from East-South-East-Borneo, and is in the Leyden Museum since 1879 (see my Catalogue Systématique des Mammifères, 1892, T. XI, p. 134), meanwhile some years ago Mr. Everett has met with it in North Borneo.