Eastward of the Molucca Islands we come to New Guinea and the islands in its immediate neighbourhood. These belong to another department of the subject. The division at present to be noticed is the Philippine portion of the Malay area. This lies northward to the parts already described, and may have received its population by any one (or more than one) of the following lines of connexion.
1. The Long island of Palawan.—Luçon, Mindoro, Busvagaon, Calamian, Palawan, Balabac, North-western Borneo.
2. The Sulu Archipelago.—Mindanao, Basilian, the Sulus, North-eastern Borneo.
3. Sangir and the islands to the north and south of it—Mindanao, Serangani, Sangir, Siao, the Guning Tellu country in the North-east of Celebes.
4. Mindanao, Serangani Salibabo, Gilolo: Gilolo being equidistant between Celebes and Papua.
The first of these lines is the most probable.
PALAWAN.
Palawan, or Paragoa, is mentioned more from its prominence as a continuity of Borneo than for the sake of description. It is little known: partially under the Spaniards, partially independent.
THE SÚLÚS.
These are also stepping-stones from Borneo. They are Malay; and the headquarters of a Malay power; the most piratical of these seas. The Sultan of Sulu is the terror of the Dyaks of Borneo. He is also the sovereign of part of that island, of part of Palawan, and of the Cayagan group. I only know the short Sulu vocabulary of Rienzi.