REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 143 



coursing streams and wealth of tropical verdure, form the elements 

 of a picture as rich in detail as it is bold in ensemble. 



The shore line is fringed with cocoanut palms, and the small sandy 

 islands on the reef are given up to the culture of the same tree. Much 

 of the uncultivated land along the coast and in the lower parts of the 

 valleys is given up to dense thickets of guavas, which, since their intro- 

 duction some years ago, have, together with the lantanas, spread Avith 

 such amazing rapidity thafc they have become a nuisance. In the 

 upper parts of the valleys the wild plantain, or "fei," with its great 

 upright bunches of fruit, as distinguished from the drooping bunches 

 of the banana, grows in abundance and is an important item in the 

 dietary of the natives, who carry it to their homes along the coast. 

 'Wild oranges, limes, and shaddocks are common and excellent in 

 quality; calladiums grow in the marshy spots; tradescantias in places 

 almost choke the streams; and along their damp margins, where level 

 tracts free of rocks occur, a species of wild ginger, the rhizomes of 

 which are used in making a native curry, grows in dense thickets, and 

 in November exhales a delicious aromatic odor from its flowers, just 

 peeping a few inches above the ground. Higher up the valleys dra- 

 csenas and tree ferns occur, tillandsias and the bird's-nest fern depend 

 from the larger trees; clambering vines, creeping pandanus, and the 

 giant fern abound among the rocks; a variety of trees, including an 

 occasional sandalwood, clothe the hillsides, and a host of small and 

 delicate plants cling to the precipitous rock faces, where dripping- 

 waters keep them perennially moist. 



In the streams the gamy little perch-like Dula lies in the pools, 

 shrimps of the genus Atya court the shelter of stones and aquatic 

 vegetation, and a crab of the family ThelphusidcB scales the vertical 

 faces of the overhanging rocks with astonishing celerity and always 

 out of reach. A little kingfisher is always found along the streams 

 and their Ary beds, apparently depending more upon insects, which 

 it catches on the wing, than upon the usual food of its kind, and in 

 the woods are at least two species of pigeons and other smaller species. 

 A large hawk was also several times observed attempting to catch the 

 ducks which make Lake Vaihiria their home, but it is said to be an 

 imported species. High up the valleys the frigate bird is always to 

 be seen sailing about the almost inaccessible crags where it makes its 

 nest, and a little white tern is commonly seen in Tahiti, as at Nuka- 

 hiva, far inland, and occasionally resting upon the trees. 



On the reefs the fauna is hardly more rich than in the Paumotus. 

 The living corals are in most places neither abundant nor varied. 

 The solitary f ungia is scattered over the reef flats, in shoal water, and 

 there are patches of reef -forming corals about the edges of the dead 

 rock, and more or less impoverished-looking clusters on its submerged 

 top, but nowhere apparently are there flourishing masses such as were 

 seen in the pass at Rairoa. Gorgonians and Alcyonaria generally are 

 poorly represented in both the Society and Paumotu archipelagoes; 



