Sandwich-Island Birds. 179 



and it has a spread of eleven feet and a half at the bottom, 

 the whole having the appearance of a mantle of gold. 

 The examples of the cloaks and capes which I examined 

 were all of the lighter shade of yellow which belongs to the 

 feathers of the present species ; and though it is possible 

 that those of both this and Drepanis pacifica were used 

 indiscriminately, one can hardly doubt that the preference 

 would not be given to those of the latter, so long as they 

 were procurable. 



The ancient kings had a regular staff of bird-catchers, 

 who were expert in their vocation. They made use of the 

 sticky juice of the bread-fruit, called in Hawaiian " Pilali/' 

 and of the tenacious gum of the fragrant " olapa," a common 

 tree in some parts of the forests, smearing the stuff about 

 the branches of a flower-covered ohia, often fastening an 

 example of the scarlet Vestiaria coccinea, of which more 

 presently, as an additional attraction to the Royal Bird 

 whose pugnacity was well known ; and in his eagerness to 

 attack his brilliant rival, he would fall an easy victim to the 

 device. That large numbers of the O-o must have been 

 taken in old days is clear from the numbers of u leis," or 

 wreaths of feathers, that now remain in the possession of 

 the natives, who still set so great a store by them that it is 

 but rarely that a traveller is able to purchase one as an 

 interesting relic of a past state of things. I was fortunate 

 in obtaining a small one at the price of fifty dollars, for the 

 construction of which it is reckoned that two hundred birds 

 must have been sacrificed. The Hon. C. R. Bishop possesses 

 some very fine examples, and the contents of a small tin box 

 of them I estimated at being worth ten thousand dollars. 

 What the value of a cloak or cape may be it is impossible to 

 say. At the ceremony of opening the Hawaiian Legislature 

 in 1888, two capes were donned by two of the native 

 officials, and very imposing they looked, though the effect 

 could not be compared with that produced by the flowing 

 war- cloak. 



This very striking and, to Hawaiians, most interesting 

 bird is preeminently a Honey- sucker, extracting the nectar 



