162 bulletin: musevm of comparative zoology. 



feet. The rainfall is liea\y ami the largest river is na^•igable for small 

 vessels for forty miles. It is heavily forested and the climate is that 

 of the moist tropics. Parts of \'iti Levu are well cultivated and the 

 population is large. 



Work pertaining to the fisheries and to ethnological collecting pre- 

 \ented systematic bird collecting in Viti Levu, but the following were 

 secured: — Lalagc pacifica, Mi/zomcia jugularis, Mcliphaga proccrior, 

 Zostcrops flanceps, Acridotheres tristis, and flycatcher {Ilaplornls 

 Icssoni). 



The Mynah (Acridotheres tristis) is common. I did not ascertain 

 when it was introduced. I found it abundant in the Hawaiian Islands 

 twenty-five years ago. It is also common in Tahiti. Wherever 

 introduced it becomes a menace to the native island species. The 

 same may be said of the ^Mongoose now common on Viti Levu. 



I was detached from the expedition at Su\a and returned home by 

 way of Samoa, the Albatross proceeding northwestward through the 

 Ellice, Gilbert, ]Marshall, Caroline, and Ladrone Islands to Japan. 



The Samoan Islands. The birds picked up at Apia, L^polu 

 Island, 26 December, were a parrot (Vini auslmlis), kingfisher 

 {Todirhamphus recurvirostris), honey eater (Myzomcla nigrivcntris) 

 and Mcliphaga carunculata. The last is rather widely distributed, 

 having been previously taken at several points in the Tongas. 



Dr. H. F. IMoore took up the work of bird collecting after I left the 

 Albatross in the Fijis. He found the bird life of the Caroline Islands 

 richer and more varied than in any of the groups visited during the 

 voyage : — 



''In the Ellice, Gilbert, and Marshall islands land birds are extremely 

 uncommon and of but few species, the avifauna being poorer than in the 

 Paumotus. The Societj' and Fiji Islands are progressively richer, but it was 

 not until the Carolines were reached that the woods and thickets seemed full 

 of birds and resounded with their songs and cries. Parrots and pigeons of 

 several species, white-eyes, flycatchers, kingfishers, and many other species 

 were observed at Kusaie, Ponape, and Truk, and the collections, which, in 

 spite of effort, had languished for lack of material after leaving Suva, began to 

 oflfer some returns to the shooters notwithstanding the brevity of the oppor- 

 tunities, which made it impossible to secure a reallj' representative collection." 



The Ellice Islands, extending in a northwesterly direction for 360 

 miles, are low atolls, most of them with central lagoons. Funafuti, 

 the only one from which birds were taken, is an atoll thirteen miles 

 long. It was visited 23 December. The land birds were the large 



