476 COMPENDIUM OF GEOGRAPHY AND TRAVEL 
of the more open parts the vegetation has an Australian 
character, owing to the presence of phyllodineous acacias, 
two casuarinas, and several kinds of Metrosideros. On 
the mountains above an elevation of 2000 feet we find 
hollies; myrtaceous, melastomaceous, and laurinaceous 
trees; epacridaceous and vaccinaceous bushes, with 
bright-coloured orchids and delicate ferns and mosses; 
but no true alpine vegetation exists. 
Omitting the Chiroptera, the mammals seem to be 
confined to three or four different species of rat, of 
which one is possibly peculiar to the group. Among 
the birds, wdiich do not differ greatly from those of the 
Tonga and Samoa groups, are no remarkably specialized 
forms. 
The islands are rather rich in land-molluscs, which 
show a distinct connection with the Australian molluscan 
fauna. Most of the shells of the Tonga and Samoa 
islands are found, but in addition the genera Placostylus , 
Nanina , Diplommatina , Pupina , and Lagocheilus; the 
first-named, as in New Caledonia, being strongly repre¬ 
sented. The genus Succinea , which is widely diffused 
throughout the Pacific, has not yet been discovered. 
Mr. A. Garrett in a recent list enumerates 146 
species as known from the group, of which 8 5 are 
peculiar to it. 
5. People. 
The Fijians are a dark-coloured, frizzly-haired, bearded 
race, reproducing in the east the tall and muscular bodies 
of the finest of the western Papuans, but much superior 
to them both in regularity of feature and in degree 
of civilisation. They exhibit, however, in some parts, 
signs of intermixture with the Polynesians of Tonga 
and Samoa, who long ago established colonies in the 
