xiv 



OKIGIN AND DISTRIBUTION OF THE HAWAIIAN AVIFAUNA. 



admits that we cannot define either Drepanidce or Frmgillidce, Ccerebida or TanagHda. 

 It is true that Dr. Gadow says Mr. Perkins has arrived at the notion that all these birds 

 are Drepanidce from the study of the habits, the voice, and the peculiarly strong and 

 disagreeable scent of these birds. There is, however, scarcely enough peculiarity in 

 the habits and voice of these birds to define their systematic position, and the peculiar 

 smell they have is equally strong or stronger in the genus Mbho, which undoubtedly 

 belongs to the MeUphagida l . This is even now noticeable in dried-up skins. It is 

 thus really the external morphology, and not the anatomy, that has altered Dr. Gadow' s 

 view. The view, nevertheless, is apparently quite correct. 



On the other hand, I cannot at all understand the force of Dr. Gadow's contention 

 that the Drepanidce are derived from forms of the south-east, which are offshoots of the 

 Colombian fauna. If we, as Dr. Gadow himself admits, do not know the origin of the 

 Drepanidce, and if he " hinted " merely at the Coerebidw, and if his hint is only " probable," 

 we cannot from that conclude that the Drepanidce are of " Colombian " origin. We 

 must therefore consider the oldest indigenous avifauna of the Sandwich Islands as being 

 of uncertain origin. 



To sum up. There are three differently-aged stocks of bird-population : — 



1. A very old original one, the origin of which is uncertain. 



2. A distinctly Polynesian branch, which is also rather old, but probably less so 



than No. 1. 



3. An American stock, which is the most recent. 



With regard to the affinities between the birds of the various islands, it is quite 

 evident that the more distant islands have a more modified avifauna. Thus the differences 

 between Kauai, Oahu, Hawaii, and the central group of islands are most marked and 

 about equally apparent, while the islands of the central group (Molokai, Lanai, and 

 Maui) have many forms in common. Thus Lanai and Molokai have the same form 

 of Phceomis, the genus Chasiempis is absent from all the three islands, the Chlorodrepanis 

 of all the three is the same, Palmeria is found on Maui and Molokai; while Loxops, 

 Hemignathus, Drepanorhamphus are each confined to a single island, but not represented 

 by allied forms on the other islands of the central group. 



The avifauna of Hawaii is by far the richest. There alone are the wonderful thick-billed 

 forms, such as Chloridops, Hhodacanthis, Loxioidcs ; there live the Raven and the Buzzard, 

 the Ciridops and the Goose ; and Hawaii was also the only known home of the extinct 

 Chcetoptila and Dennula millsi — all forms without representative allies anywhere in the group. 



1 It must also be noticed that in Mr. Perkins's own publications in the ' Ibis,' 1895, p. 118 (and foil.), the 

 Pseudonestor as well as the Chloridops are most distinctly spoken of as Fringillidce. 



