286 
ISLAND LIFE. 
[part II, 
goats, and that in consequence the cost of importing fuel for 
government use was 2,729Z. 7s. 8d. for a single year! About 
this time large numbers of European, American, Australian, and 
South African plants were imported, and many of these ran 
wild and increased so rapidly as to drive out and exterminate 
much of the relics of the native flora; so that now English 
broom gorse and brambles, willows and poplars, and some 
common American, Cape, and Australian weeds, alone meet the 
eye of the ordinary visitor. These, in Sir Joseph Hooker’s 
opinion, render it absolutely impossible to restore the native 
flora, which only lingers in a few of the loftiest ridges and 
most inaccessible precipices, and is rarely seen except by some 
exploring naturalist. 
This almost total extirpation of a luxuriant and highly pecu- 
liar vegetation must inevitably have caused the destruction of 
a considerable portion of the lower animals which once existed 
on the island, and it is rather singular that so much as has 
actually been discovered should be left to show us the nature 
of the aboriginal fauna. Many naturalists have made small 
collections during short visits, but we owe our present complete 
knowledge of the two most interesting groups of animals, the 
insects, and the land-shells, mainly to the late Mr. T. Vernon 
Wollaston, who, after having thoroughly explored Madeira and 
the Canaries, undertook a voyage to St. Helena for the express 
purpose of studying its terrestrial fauna, and resided for six 
months (1875-76) in a high central position, whence the loftiest 
peaks could be explored. The results of his labours are con- 
tained in two volumes, 1 which, like all that he wrote, are 
models of accuracy and research, and it is to these volumes 
that we are indebted for the interesting and suggestive facts 
which we here lay before our readers. 
Insects— Coleoptera . — -The total number of species of beetles 
hitherto observed at St. Helena is 203, but of these no less 
than seventy-four are common and wide-spread insects, which 
have certainly, in Mr. Wollaston’s opinion, been introduced by 
human agency. There remains 129 which are believed to be 
Colcoptcra Sancla; Ilelence, 1877 ; Testacea Atlaniica, 1878. 
