THE IBIS. 



THIRD SERIES. 



No. XXIII. JULY 1876. 



XXVII. — On the Psittaci of the Mascarene Islands. 

 By Alfred and Edward Newton. 



(Plate VI.) 



Unusual interest attaches itself to the members of the Order 

 Psittaci indigenous to the Mascarene Islands from the fact 

 thatj while all of them are species peculiar thereto, the great 

 majority have either already become extinct within the last 

 two hundred years or must be regarded as expiring. A good 

 deal of misapprehension, too, prevails as to the proper habitat 

 of some of them ; and this it may be desirable to correct. 



The Mascarene Islands are most conveniently considered 

 to form three groups : — (1) the Seychelles; (2) Mauritius and 

 Reunion (formerly Bourbon) — which, from their proximity, 

 should.be taken together, though there is much difference in 

 the omis of each ; and (3) Rodriguez. The first group con- 

 sists of an archipelago, the Land-birds of which have before 

 been treated in this journal (Ibis, 1867, pp. 335-360) ; the 

 second group, of the two islands just named — Mauritius, with 

 a few subsidiary islets attached, and Reunion, having no such 

 appendages, but rising from deep water without even the inter- 

 vention of a coral-reef. The third group is composed of one 



SER. III. VOL. VI. u 



