262 ■ FIJI ISLANDS. 



Here the trees were matted together with creepers overhead, 

 and climbing ferns {Lygodium) twined up the trunks in the 

 shade beneath. 



Two young Fijians went with me. We chmbed the steep 



dark path for a long time without hearing any bird at all. To 



see a bird without having heard it first was, from the denseness 



of the foliage, impossible. At last we heard a curious low 



whistling cry of two constantly repeated notes. The natives 



soon made out the bird overhead, but it was long before I 



could get a glimpse of it amongst the leaves, and as they kept 



bringing me nearer and nearer, in order to show it to me, 



I was so close at last that it was nearly knocked to pieces by a 



j charge of No. 12 shot. It is a constant difficulty in collecting 



/ birds in these dense tropical woods, that they are only able to 



I be distinguished at very close quarters. 



The bird proved to be a new species of Pigeon, Chrysana 

 viridis (Layard), peculiar to Kandavu Island. It is small and 

 of a yellowish-green colour, with a yellow head. The pigeons 

 of the genus Chrysana have a very remarkable structure in 

 the feathers of the breast and neck. The barbs of these 

 feathers are devoid of barbules, but are provided instead with 

 a series of small swellings, ranged at intervals along them. The 

 plumage of the bird has thus, to the naked eye, a peculiar loose 

 appearance. 



The Kandavu Island Ijirds were formerly erroneously sup- 

 posed to be the young of another Fijian species, Chrystvna 

 luteovirens, and we thus, considering all our specimens to be 

 young, concluded that this circumstance explained the peculiar 

 whistling note of the birds, which is quite unlike that of other 

 full grown pigeons. We obtained a specimen of a closely 

 similar bird from Taviuni, in which the plumage is of the 

 brightest orange {Chrysceua victor). 



As we crossed a small clearing, I shot a large Fruit-pigeon 

 {Carpophaga pacifica) which flew across; the same bird which 

 is*so common in Tonga. On returning to the bottom of the 

 valley, we heard the loud screams of the brightly coloured 

 parrot, Platycercus spkndens. There was a pair of the birds, 

 but they were so wild that I could not get a shot. They are, 

 however, not usually wild, and a large number were shot by 

 some of the officers of the ship. By the bank of the stream I 

 found a pair of the Kingfisher, which is so common in Tonga- 

 tabu, Halcyon sacra. 



A large green Lizard, which is found at Kandavu and, I 

 believe, in the other members of the Fiji group, was brought 

 to us alive. The Lizard {Chloroscartes fasciatus) is an Agamid, 

 of a genus peculiar to the Fiji group. It measures more than 



