Avifauna of the Loyalty Islands. 221 
With the aid of notes made on the spot, we will now endea- 
vour to give an idea of the ornithology of the Loyalties ; but 
we must beg the indulgence of our readers if the freshness 
of descriptions written at the time should be wanting. 
We must refer our brethren of the B. O. U. to the pages 
of the ‘Field’ for a full description of Lifu*. Suffice it to say, 
it is one of a group of islands to the eastward of New Cale- 
donia, and about one third of the distance between it and 
Tanna, the nearest of the New Hebrides. In shape it 1s 
something like the chess-piece called the ‘‘ knight ’’—a broad 
lump of land for the base, then a long neck, and finally a 
head-shaped piece. On this last, just under the chin, is 
situated the mission-station and village of Kepenché, where 
we stayed and collected. The whole of the island is flat, 
and mostly covered with fine forest. It is between forty 
and fifty miles long by half as much in breadth, and rises 
gradually in some parts to about 200 feet above the sea, from 
which it has been uplifted by successive upheavals, evidences 
of which are very apparent in the parallel lines of the water- 
worn cliffs. The whole island, according to the information 
we gathered, is formed of recent limestone, or altered coral, 
crystallized probably by heat below the surface of the water. 
The rock is honeycombed in a most remarkable manner; and 
many existing corals, madrepores, and shells are embedded 
in it. Vast caverns—bubbles done in stone, exist all over 
the island, some known and visible, more unknown, save by 
the hollow sound beneath one’s feet. All the water used is 
obtained from these, or from wells dug in the rock, through 
which water filters ; it is therefore all more or less brackish. 
To the north lies a group of islands chained together by 
an encircling reef, known by the name of Uvéa. ‘This, we 
learnt, was a great home of sea-fowl. To the south is another 
island, Maré, a solid block of land, which possesses, as we 
now know, a peculiar Blackbird, Turdus mareensis, nobis 
(Lbis, 1879, p. 472). 
Pine trees crown most of the taller headlands, such as 
the bluff of Nikitipu (lit. ‘‘the ship in sight”’), near Ke- 
* See E. L. Layard’s “ Zoological Notes from New Caledonia,” in the 
‘Field’ of Dec. 28, 1878 (vol. li. p. 828). 
