(PLATE 26, FIG. 2.)
_Rallus Sandwichensis_ Gmelin, Syst. Nat I p. 717 (1788--ex Latham!
"Habitat exilis in insulis Sandwich").
_Pennula Wilsoni_ Finsch, Notes Leyden Mus. XX p. 77 (1898--Finsch
explains that the specimen in the Leyden Museum is not the type of
Latham--and therefore of Gmelin's name--and therefore renames it).
For full synonymy and explanations of name, etc., cf. Avifauna of
Laysan, p. 239, 240 and 243, also plate LXXVI.
Latham's description--from which Gmelin's diagnosis was taken--distinctly
says that the feathers were "darkest in the middle," and in the Index
Ornith. "supra maculis obscuris." Moreover, the unpublished drawing of
Ellis, well reproduced in Mr. Scott Wilson's book, shows beyond doubt the
identity of the bird of the old authors with the specimen in the Leyden
Museum.
The Leyden specimen is all we are acquainted with, and of the history of
this bird we know nothing but Latham's statement that it came from the
Sandwich Islands.
{139}