[74] The balate--also known as "sea slug," "sea cucumber," "beche de mer," and commercially as "trepang"--is a slug (_Holothuria edulis_) used as food in the Eastern Archipelago and in China, in which country it is regarded as a delicacy by the wealthy classes, and brings from seven to fifty cents a pound in the markets. (See _U. S. Gazetteer of Philippine Islands_, pp. 482, 483.) Delgado, writing in 1754, says (p. 935) that in Manila the dried balate was usually worth thirty-five to forty (or even more) silver pesos a pico (or pecul; equivalent, in the Philippines, to 137.9 U.S. pounds). [75] "Better known as Peñon de Corón ("Crown Peak"); a small, rocky island off the eastern end of Busuañga Island, famous for the fine quality of the edible bird's-nests found there. [76] Apparently the present Calamián island is here referred to; its chief town is Culion. [77] Now known as Palawan; its northern part forms the province of Paragua, which includes many dependent islands lying near it. [78] "In general it may be said that the Philippines politically speaking, and the Philippines zoologically speaking, are not identical areas, for Balabac, Palawan, and the Calamianes Islands are strongly characterized by the presence of numerous Bornean forms which are conspicuously absent throughout the remaining islands of the archipelago. Although the Philippines are commonly held to form an eastern extension of the Indo-Malayan subregion, it should not be forgotten that at least among the birds and mammals there is a large amount of specialization in the islands to the eastward of the Balabac-Palawan-Calamianes group.... The Philippines are very poor in mammals.... They are undoubtedly well adapted to a large and diversified mammalian fauna, and the only plausible explanation of the scarcity of forms is to suppose either that they have never been connected with Borneo and the Asiatic continent or that, if at one time connected, they have since been subjected to such subsidence as to wipe out the greater part of their mammalian fauna." (U.S. Philippine Commission's _Report_, 1900, iii, p. 307.) [79] This is an error on the part of La Concepción; Fray Rodrigo went to Europe in 1622, but died there in 1626. The missions of Mindanao and Paragua were begun by Recollects who arrived at Manila in 1620 and 1622, and continued by missionaries who came in 1627 and 1637. End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XXI, 1624, by Various