THE POLYNESIANS AND THEIR PLANT-NAMES. 171 



The Chairman (A. McArthur, Esq., D.L., Vice-President). — 

 I am sure we all concur in presenting our best thanks to Dr. 

 Guppy for his interesting paper. (Applause.) We shall be glad 

 to hear remarks npon it after some communications have been 

 read. 



The Hon. SecretapvY (Captain F. Peteie, F.G.S., &c.). — Two 

 communications have been received from authorities npon the 

 subject, to whom proof copies of the paper had been sent. The 

 first is from Professor Max Miiller : — 



" Dear Captain Petrie, — I wish, indeed, I could be present to 

 hear Dr. Gnppy's paper, but I am too busy to spare a day. I am 

 much ohliged to you for having sent me the proof. It seems an 

 excellent paper written in the right spirit. Such researches, if 

 continued, ought to lead to very important results, and I hope Dr. 

 Grtippy will continue them." 



The second is from Colonel C. R. Conder, R.E., D.C.L., LL.D., 

 who, in expressing his approval of Dr. Guppy's paper, adds, "it is 

 both interesting and sound." 



Mr. W. F. KiRiiT, F.L.S., F.E.S., referred to the view advanced 

 by some that Polynesia was peopled from a great southern 

 continent, which, it is alleged, once stretched across a great 

 part of the Southern Pacific. He also referred to the voyagings 

 of Asiatic navigators in the past. 



The Rev. H. B. Hyde, M.A., spoke of the high interest attaching 

 to the subject of the paper. 



The Chairman refei'red to his long acquaintance with, and 

 voyagings among, the islands of the Pacific, especially alluding 

 to the food-producing plants found in them ; also to the character- 

 istics of the various Islanders ; and trusted that the author would, 

 as suggested by Professor Max Miiller, soon add to those obliga- 

 tions under which he had placed the Institute. 



Captain F. Petrie, F.G.S. (Hon. Sec.) alluded to the paper of the 

 Rev. S. J. Whitmee,* F.R.G.S. (Vol. XIV.), who had been for some 



* This author, referring to the Ethnology of the Pacific, says, " There are 

 three classes of peoples inhabiting those islands of the Pacific Ocean which 

 I include under the term Polynesia. In the western islands, from the 

 east end of New Guinea and Australia eastward, as far as and including 

 Fiji, we find a black frizzly-haired people. In all the Eastern islands 

 there are large brown straight-haired people (these are found also in New 

 Zealand) ; and in the western islands north of the equator there are 

 smaller brown straight-haired people. 



