AiNIMALS AND REPTILES. 247 



The list of land animals is even poorer than that 

 of the plants. Some of the islets are inhabited by 

 rats, which were brought in a ship from the Mau- 

 ritius, wrecked here. These rats are considered 

 by Mr. Waterhouse as identical with the English 

 kind, but they are smaller, and more brightly col- 

 oured. There are no true land-birds ; for a snipe 

 and a rail (Rallus Phillippensis), though living en- 

 tirely in the dry herbage, belong to the order of 

 Waders. Birds of this order are said to occur on 

 several of the small low islands in the Pacific. At 

 Ascension, where there is no land-bird, a rail (Por- 

 phyrio simplex) was shot near the summit of the 

 mountain, and it was evidently a solitary straggler. 

 At Tristan d'Acunha, where, according to Caz-mi- 

 chael, there are only two land-birds, there is a coot. 

 From these facts, I believe that the Waders, after 

 the innumerable web-footed species, are generally 

 the first colonists of small isolated islands. I may 

 add, that whenever I noticed birds, not of oceanic 

 species, very far out at sea, they always belonged 

 to this order, and hence they would naturally be- 

 come the earliest colonists of any remote point of 

 land. 



Of reptiles I saw only one small lizard. Of in- 

 sects I took pains to collect every kind. Exclusive 

 of spiders, which were numerous, there were thir- 

 teen species.* Of these, one only was a beetle. 

 A small ant swai-med by thousands under the loose 

 dry blocks of coral, and was the only true insect 

 which was abundant. Although the productions of 

 the land are thus scanty, if we look to the waters of 

 the surrounding sea, the number of organic beings 



» The thirteen species belong to the following orders : In the 

 Coleoptera, a minute Elater; Orthoptera, a Grylius and a Blatta ; 

 Hemiptera, one species ; Homoptera, two ; Neuroptera, a Chrysopa ; 

 Hymenoptera, two ants ; Lepidoptera nocturna, a Diopaea and a 

 Pterophorus (?) ; Diptera, two species. 



