ob<3 A MISSION TO VITI. 



in some parts, as has already been related ; and equally 

 irritating are the flies (Lago), which keep one's hands 

 constantly employed, and in order to have a meal in 

 peace a boy must be kept continually employed in driving 

 them away. Fleas, to finish the catalogue of irritants, are 

 not so plentiful as I have found them in Spanish America 

 or Southern Europe, nor are foreigners much troubled 

 by the vermin so abundant in the large heads of hair 

 worn by the heathen natives. Cockroaches are swarm- 

 ing in most houses, canoes, and vessels, and often dis- 

 turb one during the night, not only by running over 

 one's body but also by attacking it in right earnest. 

 Some very fine beetles and butterflies are met with ; and 

 at dusk the woods begin to swarm with myriads of fire- 

 flies. Highly curious are what are popularly termed 

 leaf- and stick-insects, species of Mantis ; the wings of 

 some of them can scarcely be distinguished from real 

 leaves. Some large kinds of spider, amongst them a 

 stinging one, have to be noticed. Centipedes, nearly a 

 foot long, were frequently encountered by us in the woods, 

 and scorpions are more frequent than one could wish. 



There is a goodly display of the lower evertebrate 

 animals, amongst them a long series of sea-slugs, sea- 

 cumbers, and beche-de-mer, annelidans, starfish, and me- 

 dusas. 



It would well repay a zoologist who has some funds 

 at his command without them he must not go to this 

 expensive place to spend a couple of years in investi- 

 gating the Fauna of Fiji. Judging from what has been 

 collected, mostly in great haste, a number of new 

 genera and species may be expected from a thorough 

 zoological examination of the group. 



