PREFACE. 



SINCE the publication of Dieffenbach's Travels in New 

 Zealand, no list has been published of the animals in- 

 habiting New Zealand and the neighbouring seas, although 

 during the last sixty years our knowledge of them has increased 

 very much. Under these circumstances, most of the zoologists 

 in New Zealand have come to the conclusion that the time has 

 arrived for making such a list to be called Index Fauna. Novce 

 Zealandia and last year they requested me to undertake the 

 editorship. This I willingly did, as I was already assured of 

 the help of all New Zealand zoologists. The Board of Governors 

 of the New Zealand Institute was asked to publish a small 

 edition of the work ; but as it declined to do so, the Philo- 

 sophical Institute of Canterbury, being generously supported by 

 the Otago Institute, undertook the responsibility. 



Mr. H. Suter, of Auckland, has supplied the Mollusca ; 

 Capt. T. Broun, of Auckland, the Coleoptera. Mr. P. Cameron, 

 of England, has sent a list of the Hymenoptera. Prof. C. Chilton, 

 of Christchurch, and Mr. G. M. Thomson, of Dunedin, have 

 supplied the Crustacea. Professor Benham, of Dunedin, has 

 furnished the Annulata and other Worms, except the terrestrial 

 Turbellarians, which was drawn up by Professor Dendy, of 

 Christchurch, who also supplied a list of the Holothurians. 

 Mr. H. Farquhar, of Wellington, has revised the Echinoidea, 

 Star-fishes, and Hydrozoa. Mr. F. W. Hilgendorf, of Lincoln, 

 has given me a list of the Rotifera ; and Prof. H. B. Kirk, of 

 Wellington, has supplied the Porifera. 



