locate the place of their origin and supply the data that will make 

 them priceless. Indeed, the ethnology of the region is so imper- 

 fectly known, that the few workers in the field are often at a loss to 

 know what line of work is the most urgent to pursue; so great 

 and manifest are the gaps in our scientific knowledge of this inter- 

 esting race. As has been said, the rapid changes which civilization 

 and commerce are effecting will soon obliterate all that remains of 

 the native culture of this people. 



Therefore the main work of the expeditions will be to study 

 the races of man inliabiting the Pacific, in a manner similar to that 

 in which the Bureau of American Ethnology has studied the 

 American Indian. Such a study should cover their physical, 

 mental, hnguistic, social, religious, aesthetic, and industrial develop- 

 ment, as well as the problems of race mixture and the causes of 

 racial decay among the primitive tribes inliabiting the multitude 

 of Pacific islands. Since the material for the elucidation of many 

 of the problems involved does not exist in any museum or museums, 

 exhaustive collections must be made, both in the field and by pur- 

 chase, which will illustrate their crafts before it is too late to secure 

 them. 



Next in importance is the study of land biology. The limited 

 size of the majority of the islands makes the extermination of exist- 

 ing peculiar forms a matter speedily accomplished by the intro- 

 duction of foreign plants and animals, or unusual conditions. For 

 example, among the birds on the island of Oahu the number of 

 species known to science which have been exterminated since their 

 description exceeds those now existing on the island. Still in the 

 Pacific there remain many islands unexplored by scientists and 

 thousands of forms of animal life that are as yet undescribed. 



In the plant world similar conditions exist. There are hundreds 

 of species which are unknown; while the geographical extent, 

 abundance, variation, native names, and economic uses of all the 

 plants of the region must be investigated and recorded. Such a 

 survey will, without doubt, aid materially in the development and 

 utilization of the botanical resources of the tropical islands of the 

 world. 



The value of the study of the shore fauna and flora cannot be 



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