UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
BUREAU OF BIOLOGICAL SURVEY 
WASHINGTON, D. C. 
June 1, 1923. 
BI-S 
Hawaii 
ADDRESS REPLY TO 
CHIEF, BUREAU OF BIOLOGICAL SURVEY, 
AND REFER TO 
Dr. Alexander Wetmore, 
C/0 Bishop Museum, 
Honolulu, T. Hawaii. 
Dear Dr. Wetmore: 
Receipt is acknowledged of 7 Boxes of specimens By 
express and one By mail. All of this material arrived in 
excellent condition, and was looked over with much interest 
By Dr. Helson. 
Your radiograms of May 24, announcing a landing on 
Gardiner Island, and of May 27, saying that you were proceeding 
to Honolulu for 10 days, are also received. 
* 
The Birds are a fine lot, and in addition to those we 
already have will give us a good representation of specimens 
of the avifauna of those islands, excepting of course the species 
that have Become extinct or are threatened with extinction. 
The 13 specimens of the small rat were noted with 
interest. This is a small species of Rattus Belonging to a 
group widely distributed in the Islands of the Pacific, where 
it has evidently Been carried nearly everywhere in the past By 
Boats. It has Become divided into a great nuraBer of very slightly 
differentiated forms which have different local peculiarities on 
nearly every Island. One was described as I remember a few years 
ago from one of the islands near Hawaii where the mongoose was 
unable to reach it, which proves to Be very closely related to 
a species occurring in Celebes. 
We had a letter from Dickey saying that his personal 
relations with you and with the other members of the expedition 
were most pleasant. But he had some disparaging remarks to mate 
concerning the weather under which he had bad to carry on his 
operations, and which prevented his getting the detailed habit 
studies that he wished. However, he seemed on the whole fairly 
well satisfied with the results of the trip. 
With kind regards, I am, 
S incerely yours, 
(X.‘ - 
In Charge, 
Biological Investigations. 
