strangely confusing the story of his own life with the story of the village. He recalled, he said, a man who had once come to the village many years ago looking for birds, insects, and reptiles. He, like us, had also been on the lookout for a crested pigeon (he drew an outline of the bird on the sand). Although he had been unable to find one he had succeeded very well in catching a number of birds(evidently ground doves) with lime. This man had remained in the region of Kariki over a month. The captain and I concluded that he must have been Meeks, Rothchilds' man. The village is a well constructed one. As an anchorage it is protected from every quarter. There are no mosquitoes present, and the water sounded for twelve fathoms a hundred and fifty feet off shore. There is a handsome leaf and timber church, which took seven years to build, and a broad sand and coral road fringed with croton bushes runs through the village from it. The houses, which are the best I have yet seen here, are lined on either side of this road leading away from the church. Farther on it dwindles into a path ending up on the beach. Not so many years ago the American schooner Montauk, of New York, went ashore in the Manning Straits and much of the lumber which she carried drifted up to Kariki. Starling explained that this was the reason that the houses looked so well- for they are largely made of this timber.