AVES NORTH 85 



In a note contributed by Mr. Whitmee he writes as follows : 

 "In addition to the birds included in the foregoing list, he 

 (Mr. Jansen) saw a Carpophaga in the Ellice Islands ; and the 

 Frigate-bird (Fregata aquild) also occurs there. In fact the 

 latter bird is domesticated by the natives ; and when I was in 

 those islands in 1870, I saw scores of them about the villages 

 sitting on long perches erected for them near the beach. The 

 natives procure the ) oung birds and tie them by the leg and feed 

 them till they are tame. Afterwards they let them loose, and 

 they go out to sea to get their food, and return to their perches 

 in the villages a* intervals. I cnnnot say to what species the 

 Carpoplaga is referable, not having seen it myself. Mr. Jansen 

 procured young ones in May and June ; but he thinking that 

 they were the same as the Pigeon found in Samoa (C. pacifica), 

 did not preserve any specimens. Natives of the Ellice Islands 

 who were in Samoa when I left tl.ere told me their Pigeon is like 

 the Samoan species, ' " except that it is smaller owing to its food 

 being less plentiful." 



Mr. Hedley informs me that he did not see any tame Frigate- 

 birds on Funafuti, but on Nukulailai on August 2nd, 1896, he 

 saw one unattached on a tall perch in front of the teacher's house. 

 There is no doubt, however, that Fregata aquila still inhabits 

 Funafuti or some of the neighbouring atolls, for the " titi's " 

 brought back by Mr. Hc-dley and worn by the natives of both 

 sexes on festive occasions, were ornamented with the feathers of 

 this species. 



The use these birds were put to as message carriers between 

 the scattered atolls of the Ellice Group, is thus described by the 

 Rev. Dr. George Turner, of the London Missionary Society* : 



" When I visited the group in 1876, I found that the Samoan 

 native pastors on four of the islands were in the habit of corres- 

 ponding by means of carrier Frigate-birds. While I was in the 

 pastor's house on Funafuti on a Sunday afternoon, a bird arrived 

 with a note from another pastor on Nukufetau, sixty miles 

 distant. It was a foolscap 8vo leaf dated on the Friday, done up 

 inside a light piece of reed, plugged with a bit of cloth, and 

 attached to the wing of the bird. In former times the natives 

 sent pearl-shell fish-hooks by Frigate-birds from island to island. 

 I observed they had them as pets on perches at a number of 

 islands in this "Ellice Group," fed them on fish, and when there 

 was a favourable wind the creatures had an instinctive curiosity 

 to go and visit another island, where on looking down they saw a 

 perch, and hence our Samoan pastors, when they were located 

 there, found an ocean postal service all ready to their hand !" 



* Turner Samoa a hundred years ago and long before. 1884, p. 282. 



