CHAP, xv THE SANDWICH ISLANDS 321 



peculiar Cerambycidse must have been introduced by the 

 same means. The absence of so many important and 

 cosmopolitan groups whose size or constitution render them 

 incapable of being thus transmitted over the sea, as well 

 as of man}^ which seem equally w^ell adapted as those 

 w^hich are found in the islands, indicate how rare have been 

 the conditions for successful immigration; and this is still 

 further emphasized by the extreme specialisation of the 

 fauna, indicating that there has been no repeated 

 immigration of the same species which would tend, as in 

 the case of Bermuda, to preserve the originally intro- 

 duced forms unchanged by the effects of relocated inter- 

 crossing. 



Vegetation of the Sandicich Islands. — The flora of these 

 islands is in many respects so peculiar and remarkable, 

 and so well supplements the information derived from its 

 interesting but scanty fauna, that a brief account of its 

 more striking features will not be out of place ; and we 

 fortunately have a pretty full knowledge of it, owing to 

 the researches of the German botanist Dr. W. Hilde- 

 brand.^ 



Considering their extreme isolation, their uniform 

 volcanic soil, and the large projDortion of the chief island 

 which consists of barren lava-fields, the flora of the 

 Sandwich Islands is extremely rich, consisting, so far as at 

 present known, of 844 species of flowering plants and 155 

 ferns. This is considerably richer than the Azores (439 

 Phanerogams and 39 ferns), which though less extensive 

 are perhaps better known, or than the Galapagos (332 

 Phanerogams), which are more strictly comparable, being 

 equally volcanic, w^hile their somewhat smaller area may 

 perhaps be compensated by their proximity to the 

 American continent. Even New Zealand with more than 

 twenty times the area of the Sandwich group, whose soil 

 and climate are much more varied and whose botany has 

 been thoroughly explored, has rot a very much larger 

 number of flowering plants (935 species), while in ferns it 

 is barely equal. 



^ Flora of the Haivaiian Islands, by W. Hildebrand, M.D., annotated 

 and publislied after the author's death by W. F. Hildebrand, 1888. 



Y 



