222 A NATURALIST IN CANNIBAL LAND 



further made happy by discovering ten or twelve 

 new butterflies of the genus Delias. They are white 

 butterflies as regards the top side of the wings, but 

 on the under side the wings show the most beautiful 

 colours : in some instances black and grey, in others 

 black and red all very peculiar and very beautiful. 

 The males and the females of this genus are in some 

 instances very much alike, except that the females 

 are darker in colouring than the males. 1 



It needed such good collecting to atone for the 

 hardships of the life there. The country had never 

 been visited before by white people, and that, of course, 

 made possible a number of new discoveries, but it also 

 made it impossible to get on terms with the natives ; 

 so we were unable to secure any native food, and had 

 to live on the tinned stores which we carried up from 

 the coast. It would have been possible, of course 

 if I had chosen to sanction the attempt to have 

 raided some of the native villages near by for food ; 

 but during the course of my experiences as a collector 

 I have never attempted any violent robbery. Occa- 

 sionally a few pigeons which fell to our guns helped 



1 Besides these and other wonderful Birds of Paradise (among 

 them the smallest of all Paradiseidae, Loboparadisea sericea, 

 Rothsch., a new form of Falcinellus striatus, a young male of the 

 most curious of all Birds of Paradise, the Pteridophora alberti), 

 Mr. Meek discovered several new small birds ; among them were 

 three Honey-eaters, viz. Melirrhophetes belfordi griseirostris. 

 Ptilotis praeripna nigritergum and Melipotes gymnops goliathi, 

 The collection will be fully discussed in our journal, Nov. Zool. 

 E. H. 



