BIRDS, REPTILES, AND FISHES.

The only other bird which I shall mention is a very fine kingfisher (Halcyon saurophaga) with white head, neck, and lower parts, green scapulars, and blue wings and tail, previously known by a single specimen from New Guinea in the British Museum.  It is a very shy bird, frequenting the margin of the island, usually seen perched on some detached or solitary branch, as if sunning itself, and darting off into the dense brush upon being approached.

Small lizards were plentiful, but we met with no large ones or snakes during our rambles on the Duchateau Isles.  These islands are probably much resorted to by turtles, as they were daily seen swimming about, and one was caught on shore during our stay by a party of natives.  The variety of fishes caught at this anchorage was considerable, and furnished many additions to the ichthyological collection, to which the paucity of other objects in zoology for some time back enabled me to bestow much attention.* Among the genera most remarkable for singularity of form and brilliancy of colouring I may mention Holocentrum, five kinds of which were procured here, one brilliantly coloured with blue and silver, and the remainder more or less of a bright scarlet.

(Footnote.  Besides many kinds preserved in spirits, which have not yet been examined, my collection contained stuffed specimens of about forty species of Louisiade fishes.  These, I have been informed by Sir John Richardson, have nearly all been previously described from other parts of Oceania, the Indian Ocean, and the China Sea.  The family Sparidae is that best represented in the Louisiade Archipelago so far as I could judge—­three species of Pentapus numerically more than equal all the rest, and the next commonest fish is Diacope octo-lineata.)

SHELLS AND HERMIT-CRABS.

The landshells appear here to be limited to a solitary Helicina, found on the leaves and trunks of trees; and the trifling amount of rise and fall of tide, not exceeding three feet, prevented any search for marine species upon the reef.  By dredging, however, in some of the sandy channels among the coral patches, in two or three fathoms water, some small Mitrae, Nassae, Subulae, and other interesting shells were procured, but no zoophytes came up in the dredge, and hardly any crustacea.  One can scarcely avoid taking notice of the prodigious numbers of small hermit-crabs (Coenobita) tenanting dead univalve shells, and occurring from the margin of the beach as far back as the centre of the islands, where they are found even in the holes of decaying trees at some height above the ground.

During our stay at this anchorage the weather was fine for the first three days, but afterwards was usually hazy, with strong breezes from between east and south-east, with squalls and occasional showers, the thermometer ranging between 72 and 85 degrees—­respectively the maximum and minimum temperature registered on board.