162 bulletin: museum of comparative zoology. 



feet. The rainfall is heavy and the largest river is navigable for small 

 vessels for forty miles. It is heavily forested and the climate is that 

 of the moist tropics. Parts of Viti Levu are well cultivated and the 

 population is large. 



Work pertaining to the fisheries and to ethnological collecting pre- 

 vented systematic bird collecting in Viti Levu, but the following were 

 secured: — Lalage pacifica, Myzomela jugularis, Meliphaga procerior, 

 Zosterops fiaviceps, Acridotheres tristis, and flycatcher {Haplornis 

 lessoni) . 



The Mynah {Acridotheres tristis) is common. I did not ascertain 

 when it was introduced. I found it abundant in the Hawaiian Islands 

 twenty-five years ago. It is also common in Tahiti. Wherever 

 introduced it becomes a menace to the native island species. The 

 same may be said of the Mongoose now common on Viti Levu. 



I was detached from the expedition at Suva and returned home by 

 way of Samoa, the Albatross proceeding northwestward through the 

 Ellice, Gilbert, Marshall, Caroline, and Ladrone Islands to Japan. 



The Samoan Islands. The birds picked up at Apia, LTpolu 

 Island, 26 December, were a parrot {Vini auMralis), kingfisher 

 {Todirhamphiis recurrirostris), honey eater (Myzomela nigripentris) 

 and Meliphaga carunculata. The last is rather widely distributed, 

 having been previously taken at several points in the Tongas. 



Dr. H. F. Moore took up the work of bird collecting after I left the 

 Albatross in the Fijis. He found the bird life of the Caroline Islands 

 richer and more varied than in an;^' of the groups visited during the 

 voyage : — 



"In the Ellice, Gilbert, and Marshall islands land birds are extremely 

 uncommon and of but few species, the avifauna being poorer than in the 

 Paumotus. The Society and Fiji Islands are progressively richer, but it was 

 not until the Carolines were reached that the woods and thickets seemed full 

 of birds and resounded with their songs and cries. Parrots and pigeons of 

 several species, white-eyes, flycatchers, kingfishers, and many other species 

 were observed at Kusaie, Ponape, and Truk, and the collections, which, in 

 spite of effort, had languished for lack of material after leaving Suva, began to 

 offer some returns to the shooters notwithstanding the brevity of the oppor- 

 tunities, which made it impossible to secure a really representative collection." 



The Ellice Islands, extending in a northwesterly direction for 360 

 miles, are low atolls, most of them with central lagoons. Funafuti, 

 the onlv one from which birds were taken, is an atoll thirteen miles 

 long. It was visited 23 December. The land birds were the large 



