I had not done any homework for a circumnavigation of the south island of New Zealand. The reason I had not done so is simple. We were not meant to make that voyage but the storms in the Southern Ocean were so severe that a tour of the sub-antarctic islands had to be abandoned. As it was I did not notice passing a small island of historical significance to anybody interested in birds and their extinction. Had the sea been calmer in an area with infamously high winds and strong currents, the plan was to launch the Zodiacs and have a close look at the island but it wasn’t and afternoon tea (Devonshire cream tea plus sandwiches and cakes, since you ask) went uninterrupted.
The island is Stephens Island off the northernmost tip of the Marlborough Sounds and known to all reptile enthusiasts as one of the strongholds of the Tuatara. And no, I have never seen a Tuatara in the wild although a familiarity with its diapsid skull was an essential part of classical zoology; most university museums had a specimen. It is also famous as the final refuge and site of extinction of the flightless Lyall’s Wren (Traversia lyalli).
The story of the wren, the lighthouse keeper and the cats has been expanded by some urban myths but the whole story of how the last individuals of this small bird were first discovered in 1894, collected and then wiped out by feral cats only two years later is best described in this Wikipedia article which pulls together the facts and likeliest scenario. On mainland New Zealand the flightless wren had already been wiped out, probably by the Pacific Rat (Rattus exulans) which arrived along with the Maori from Polynesia in the 13th Century.
The scientific name itself is a reminder of the bitter feud it caused between two leading ornithologists of the day, Sir Walter Buller FRS and Walter, later Lord, Rothschild FRS. Naming new species was the name of the game in Victorian ornithology and the name, Traversia lyalli, was given by Rothschild. The rule of the game is that the first to publish the new name takes the prize. If somebody else publishes a new name later, that name does not stand.
The animosity arose because Buller was shown the first specimen to be collected by the lighthouse keeper, David Lyall. Buller, who recognised it instantly as a new species, borrowed the dead bird and sent it to the illustrator J.G. Keulemans in London. Buller then sent off a paper to the Ibis, complete with illustration, describing and naming the species as Xenicus insularis. Lyall then collected other specimens but sold them to the dealer, Henry Travers. Travers shrewdly reckoned that Lord Rothschild would be willing and able to pay more than Buller. He was right. Rothschild bought the nine birds and had them shipped to England. Rothschild then rapidly wrote a description of the bird—and named it Traversia lyalli—for a meeting of the British Ornithologists' Club. Ernst Hartert read the paper on behalf of, and in the absence of, Rothschild. Philip Lutley Sclater FRS was both the Club’s President and editor of the Ibis. He told Hartert that Buller’s paper for the Ibis was in the press but Hartert said he could not withdraw the paper without Rothchild’s consent. Well, he would say that, to quote Mandy Rice-Davies; Hartert was on Rothschild’s payroll.
After the Club’s meeting on 19 December 1894, the Bulletin containing Rothschild’s paper was published, astonishingly quickly, 10 days later, on 29 December. Buller’s paper, in the press since before the meeting of the Club, had to wait until April 1895 for publication in the Ibis.
Buller, not surprisingly, was described as incandescent with rage. He continued to call the bird Xenicus insularis for the rest of his life and attacked Rothschild, with whom he had dealt with—and sold bird specimens to—at every opportunity.
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| Keulemans's illustration for Buller's paper in the Ibis |
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| Keulemans depicted a male and female for Buller's last book - the Supplement in 1905-06 |
Looking at Rothschild’s behaviour nearly 125 years after the event, I would have to ask. Was it possible for Hartert to contact Rothschild after the meeting and before publication to tell him what had happened? If so, did he do so? And would Rothschild have had time to withdraw the paper or to change the wording to acknowledge Buller’s real priority and name for the bird? If the answer to the last question is ‘Yes’, then I have Lord Rothschild down for conduct unbefitting a gentleman.
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| Walter Rothschild |
Buller versus Rothschild continued on this and other matters ornithological, with every opportunity being taken in print to have a go at the other. The best analogy I can think of is a Twitter War in slow motion.
The vituperation continued after Buller’s death in 1906. Rothschild’s book, Extinct Birds (Hutchinson: London) was published in 1907. Under literature referring to extinct birds he wrote:
1905-1906. Sir Walter Buller. Supplement to the “Birds of New Zealand."Two volumes. (Though containing very interesting notes on extinct and threatened birds, these two volumes are rather disappointing. They contain very little that is new, and are mainly composed of quotations from other people's writings or letters. Buller's former great book on the Birds of New Zealand was a most important and creditable work, though not without shortcomings. Our knowledge of New Zealand Birds might have been brought up to date in his supplement, but we cannot say that this has been done properly, and errors are frequent.)
And on the still extant birds, the Chatham Island Robin (Petroica traversi) and Snares Tomtit (P. dannefaerdi):
Sir Walter Buller…has confounded M. traversi and dannefaerdi, and the figure he gave on his plate looks so black, that I do not doubt it represents rather the latter than the former. Of course M. dannefaerdi alone occurs on the Snares, and Buller's traversi from the Snares were all dannefaerdi. Dr. Finsch's statement (Ibis 1888, p. 308) that Reischek's specimen from the Snares "agreed in every respect with specimens from the Chatham Islands" is entirely wrong, for, even if one prefers unscientifically to lump allied forms, one cannot say that a Miro from the Chathams agrees in every respect with one from the Snares. Buller's doubts about the distinctness of the latter might easily have been removed, if he had taken the trouble to compare them, for it does not require any genius to see the differences. I admit that with my present views on geographical forms I would regard the two Miro as sub-species, and call them M. traversi traversi and M. traversi dannefaerdi, but most ornithologists would still consider them to be "good species."
I may add that Buller…has not quoted my description correctly, for in his rendering are several disturbing misprints, and in the fourth line from the bottom occurs a "not" which ought not to be there, and which makes the sentence incomprehensible. Also the name itself is spelt incorrectly.
Rothschild’s take on the by-then-extinct Lyall’s Wren story:
I received nine specimens of this new bird, and was not aware that any others had been taken at that time. As I was unable to attend the December meeting, 1894, of the British Ornithologists Club, I asked Dr. Hartert to exhibit the birds in my name. When he had done so and had read the description, the Chairman, Dr. P. L. Sclater, said that the bird had also been received for illustration and description in the Ibis, from Sir Walter Buller, and he asked Dr. Hartert if I would not withdraw my description. Dr. Hartert said that this was unfortunate, but he had no authority to withdraw my description, and he and Dr. Sharpe thought that the proceedings of the meeting should be printed without consideration of any manuscripts which might refer to the same bird. No doubt this was hard luck on Sir Walter Buller, but it would have been equally hard luck for me if he had forestalled me with the new bird. He had only one specimen, I had nine, of both sexes, and I had paid a high price for them, as types of a new bird. My type is in Tring, and, as everybody knows, available for study by any competent ornithologist, while Buller's type was not in any museum, and it was uncertain to whom he would sell it afterwards. I suppose it is now in the Carnegie Museum, Pittsburgh, to which Buller's "third collection," 625 specimens, was sold for a thousand pounds, as Buller himself tells us in his Supplement II, p. 167, under the heading of Glaucopis wilsoni!
On the same page Sir Walter Buller also tells us that his "second collection" was sold to me, but he makes a mistake about the price, as I certainly did not pay a thousand pounds for it.
I mentioned these unimportant details, because Buller rather bitterly and severely complained about my describing the Stephens' Island Wren, on p. 111 of his supplement. I may only add that of course my name, being published in December, 1894, has the priority over his, which was not published before April, 1895.
Another well-aired disagreement was whether there were two species (one North Island, one South) of the now extinct Laughing Owl (Sceloglaux albifacies):
Having thus discussed the age of this owl, the question must be considered if it is different from S. albifacies from the South Island. This is less easily done. Buller described it as a "new species," and mentions among the distinctive characters (see above) the colour of the tail. The tail, however, is "skillfully" (as Buller calls it, though I should use a less complimentary adverb) stuck in, and does not belong to a Sceloglaux, but to an Australian Ninox, and also some feathers on the neck are foreign.
There are other examples but that’s enough for anybody. The whole sorry story, the owl, the wren and Buller's sales and attempted sales of specimens to Rothschild (the latter had a flock of live kiwis supplied by the former), can be found in Errol Fuller's book, Extinct Birds.
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| Keulemans also illustrated Rothschild's book. A pair of Lyall's Wrens in the corner of a plate |
So while Rothschild thought he was entitled to name the bird because he ‘had paid a high price for them’ we can only marvel at his sense of entitlement. The wren’s recently-studied DNA does though indicate that Rothschild was right to have erected the genus Traversia, separate from Xenicus.
Unfortunately, none of the acrimony was of any use to the bird itself. It was dead; an ex-wren; extinct, lingering only as dead specimens in museums to remind us of the great damage done to the original fauna of New Zealand.
Galbreath R, Brown D. 2004. The tale of the lighthouse-keeper’s cat: Discovery and extinction of the Stephens Island wren (Traversia lyalli). Notornis 51, 193-200.
Updated 9 April 2019
Updated 9 April 2019
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