On a Collection of Birds from the Marquesas Islands. 249 



the latter skims along just above his head, like a flash of 

 lightning throws his bola above the bird, which, entangled 

 in the cord, falls and becomes his prey. The captured bird 

 is fastened by a cord around the wings and placed on the 

 platform of the bower among the other victims of this sport. 

 As far as I could ascertain, the natives make no peculiar use 

 of the birds, and the only prize of the sport seems to be the 

 possession of the greatest number of these birds, which is 

 considered as a privilege and attribute of chieftainship. One 

 of the chiefs was bent on getting sixty Frigate-birds alive, and 

 required only one dozen to make up the number, thirty having 

 been captured for him by one bird-catcher and eighteen by 

 another. 



If I find time I will give you a further account of this 

 peculiar mode of catching birds ; but I must finish now, as 

 my attention is absorbed by the view of the glorious moun- 

 tainous coast of the Solomon Islands, along which we are now 

 steaming, and which is, of course, a country of great promise 

 to a naturalist. 



XIX. — Notes on a Collection of Birds from the Marquesas 

 Islands. By H. B. Tristram, F.R.S. 



I HAVE lately received a jar of birds from the Marquesas 

 Islands in spirits ; and so little is known of the avifauna of 

 that the most distant group of the Pacific, that a few remarks 

 on this collection may have some interest for my brother 

 ornithologists. 



The collection contains twenty-nine specimens of fourteen 

 species, most of them well known as natives of these islands. 

 Of the fourteen only four are land-birds ; and the rare and 

 curious Pigeons, Ptilopus mercieri, Serresius galeatus, and 

 Calcenas rubescens, are^ I regret to say, not represented. 



1. CoRiPHiLUS sMARAGDiNUs, Hombr. & Jacq. 



There are four specimens of this gorgeous little Parrot. 

 Unfortunately, as comparison with a few skins in my collec- 

 tion shows, their sojourn for nine months in a jar of spirits 



