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NUMENIUS TAHITIENSIS. 



KIOEA. 



"Otaheite Curlew/-' Latham, Gen. Synops. iii. p. 122 (1785). 



Scolopax tahitiensis, Grnelin, Syst. Nat. i. p. 656 (1788). 



Numenius tahitiensis, Latham, Ind. Orn. ii. p. 711 (1790) ; Vieillot, N. Diet. d'Hist. Nat. viii. 

 p. 308 (1817) ; id. Encycl. Meth. p. 1157 (1823) ; Stephens, Shaw's Zool. xii. pt. 1, p. 32 

 (1824) ; G. R. Gray, Gen. B. iii. p. 569 (1847) ; id. Cat. B. Trop. Isl. p. 49 (1859) ; Ridgway, 

 Proc. U.S. Nat. Mus. 1880, p. 201 ; Baird, Brewer, & Ridgway, Water-B. N. Am. i. p. 324 

 (1884) ; Turner, Contr. N. H. Alaska, p. 190 (1886) ; Seebohm, Geogr. Distr. Charadriidje, 

 p. 333 (1887) ; Nelson (& Henshaw), Rep. N. H. Coll. Alaska, p. 121, pi. (1887) ; Wigles- 

 worth, Aves Polynesise, p. 66 (1891). 



" Le Tevrea," Sonnini, Hist. Nat. Buffon, Ois. xxii. p. 280 (1803-4) . 



Scolopax phesopus ?, Forster, Descr. Anim. (Lichtenstein), pp. 156, 242 (1844). 



Numenius femoralis, Peale, U.S. Expl. Exped. Birds, p. 233, pi. 64. fig. 1 (1848) ; Hartlaub, Arch. 

 f. Naturgesch. 1852, i. p. 120; id. Journ. f. Orn. 1854, p. 170; Cassin, U.S. Expl. Exped., 

 Mamm.&Om. p. 316, pi. xxxvii. (1858) ; G. R. Gray, Cat. B. Trop. Isl. p. 50 (1859) ; Finsch 

 & Hartlaub, Beitr. Fauna Centralpolyn. p. 175 (1867) ; Ridgway, Am. Nat. 1874, p. 435 ; 

 Finsch, Ibis, 1880, pp. 220, 432; Tristram, Ibis, 1881, p. 251 ; id. op. cit. 1883, p. 47; Layard, 

 Ibis, 1882, p. 533 \ 



Numenius phceopus {partim), Schlegel, Mus. Pays-Bas, Scolopaces, p. 93 (1864). 



Numenius australis, Dole, Proc. Bost. Soc. N. H. xii. p. 303 (1869) ; id. Hawaiian Alman. 1879, 

 p. 51 (nee Gould). 



Numenius taitensis, Coues, Check-List, ed. 2, p. 105 (1882) ; id. Key N. Am. B. ed. 2, p. 646 

 (1884) . 



Great credit is due to Peale, the chief ornithologist of the United States Exploring 

 Expedition under Commander Wilkes, for detecting what is unquestionably the most 

 remarkable character of the present species, namely, that afforded by the shafts of some 

 of the flank-feathers, which are elongated nnd devoid of barbs near the tip. At the same 

 time he seems to have been mistaken in supposing that the bird had not been described 

 before, even though this peculiarity escaped the observation of Forster and of Latham, 

 as it may well have done. There can be scarcely any doubt that it was the bird found 

 on Otaheiti and the adjacent islands, and taken by the former authority to be the 

 Scolopax phceopus of Linnaeus, while the latter more properly recognized it as a new 

 species of Curlew. The specimen he described from Sir Joseph Banks's collection has 

 of course long since perished, and it is certainly true that no other is known to have 

 been since brought from Tahiti, where it was called by the natives " Tevrea " or 



By an error in a second passage on this page, and also in a footnote of the page following, the epithet 

 femoralis appears as tibialis. 



