Did you ever see a humming-bird? If you live in the country, or if you
have been in the country during summer, very probably you may have done
so, though in our Eastern and Middle States, and, in fact, in any part
of the Atlantic States, they are not very abundant. Only one species,
the ruby-throat, will you find east of the Mississippi, except that the
Mango humming-bird comes over from Cuba into Florida, and then follows a
little way further up the coast. But if you have ever seen one, you are
not likely to forget it. There is no family of birds which attracts more
attention, or which deserves more. Their size and their movements make
them really objects of wonder. They are the smallest of all flying
things, except insects, and in truth some of them are decidedly smaller
than many of the large insects. And then, too, they come and go so like
magic as always to astonish those who are not accustomed to watching
them.
You see one hovering over a flower, but you can not tell how he hovers,
for he moves his wings so rapidly that you can not see them; there he
hangs in the air, making all the time a low _hum_, from which he takes
his name, and which is caused by the flapping of his wings. You are
looking at him, and all at once he is not there; but you probably did
not see him go, for he shot away so quickly that you failed to detect
it, and perhaps in another second there he is again, hanging in the same
place, over the same flower. That is what a humming-bird does, and it is
not strange that they are counted so wonderful, especially when you add
to it all the fact that their colors are almost always very brilliant.
Even our own little ruby-throat, which comes so far to the north,
flashes like a fiery coal when he brings his red throat to glance in the
sunlight.
[Illustration: HUMMING-BIRDS AND NEST.]
I have said that humming-birds in general are marked with brilliant
colors. This is strictly true; but among them all there is scarcely one
more gorgeously elegant than the one whose picture you see here, and
whose Spanish name I have placed at the head of this account. Perhaps
you can not read it in Spanish, but you can in English; it means _the
gold and emerald tuft or curl_; and when I tell you more about him, you
will understand the reason for such a name. I do not think the name is a
common one; perhaps it is called so only by the people who told it to
me; but it struck me as being so beautiful, and fitting the bird so
nicely, that I have always loved to remember it. In works on natural
history it is called _Rhamphomicron microrhynchum_. What do you think of
that? What a horrid long name to give to such a lovely little fellow! It
is as long as the bird himself. I doubt if you can pronounce it. El
Bucle (boo'-klay) de Esmeralda y Oro sounds to me like music in
comparison with it. Shall I tell you where I first saw him?
It was in a place almost as remarkable as the bird himself. The species
is found only on the west coast of South America, and even there you do
not see it until you reach the high valleys of the Andes.
I had landed about two weeks before at Truxillo, which is a port in Peru
a little more than three hundred miles north of Lima. Look on your map,
and find it. You will see that it is about eight degrees south of the
equator. The name is Spanish, and you must pronounce it Trooheel'-yo.
Does that sound strange to you? It should not; you ought to be taught to
pronounce it that way in school. The Spanish _x_ sounds like our letter
_h_. Truxillo was founded by Pizarro nearly three hundred and fifty
years ago, in 1535. But we must not stop here; we are looking for El
Bucle.
It was the third day after my leaving Truxillo, when I found myself in a
deep valley filled with flowers, and over the first flowering bush a
humming-bird was hovering. I saw at once not only that he was very
beautiful, but that he was different from any one that I had seen. It
was my custom there to keep one barrel of my gun prepared especially for
humming-birds, that is, loaded with what is called dust-shot, thus
enabling me to kill them without tearing their skins, as large shot
would do. It was but a minute, and I had my new bird in my hand. The
right-hand figure of the two in this plate represents him as I saw him
then, excepting that here the colors are not given, but I will describe
them to you.
The top of his head and his back--his cap and mantle, so to speak--were
of the most exquisite deep dark violet; his throat looked like polished
gold, its long scaly feathers appearing to be gilded plates; while his
sides and breast shone like emeralds, so bright was their green color.
You see that his under surface was thus all emerald and gold--_esmeralda
y oro_--only that his delicate little feet, almost too small to be seen,
were so white as to fairly sparkle. At the same time his wings and tail
were of a rich purplish-black. Can you imagine anything more elegant? I
sat down to admire him, turning him over and over in my hand, and while
I was thus engaged I heard a step, and looking up, I saw that one of the
native girls from a house just below was coming toward me. I spoke to
her, and after the usual salutation I asked her, "Señorita, como se
llama este pajarito hermoso?"--"What do you call this beautiful little
bird?"--and then she told me its name, just as I have told it to you.
She also told me that the skins were sometimes set to wear as a brooch
or buckle, and I did not wonder at it, so very beautiful were the
colors.
These figures are of the natural size, and you can judge for yourself
how small he is. Even with such a long tail as he has, his entire length
is only three and a half inches, thus making him decidedly smaller than
our ruby-throated humming-bird. As I went on down the valley I found
them in abundance, and I found also that in that valley scarcely any
other species was to be seen.
I was constantly watching for their nests, and before very long I saw
one, and you have it represented here, with the two birds sitting on its
edge. It was a very difficult matter to distinguish the nest, either
that one or the others which I afterward saw, for they looked almost
precisely like little knots on the bark. I found the first from seeing
the bird sitting on it, and having learned how they look, I was able to
find others. I climbed up to examine a number of them, and they were
really very charmingly built. They were made of fine twigs and mosses,
the inside being lined with the soft down from plants, while the outside
was covered over with lichens, evidently with the intention of hiding
the nest by causing it to look only like a knot or lump on the bark, and
it was so neatly done as to require close search before the nest could
be found.
You have seen from what I have said, even if you have not noticed it
yourself, that humming-birds come about flowers of various kinds
constantly, and evidently do it for some object. Perhaps you have been
told that they get their food from the flowers. Do you know of what that
food consists? It was formerly always said that they sucked the honey
from the flowers, and that the honey constituted their food, and I have
read many accounts in which the attempt was made to show how nicely
their bills were fitted to draw up the honey from the bottom of the
flower. We know now that this is not so. The humming-bird has nothing to
do with the sweet fluid in the flowers, which by-the-way is not honey,
though it is often called so; he cares nothing for it. Then why does he
come to the flowers, you may ask, if he is not getting something from
them. He is getting something; he is getting his food; but that food is
insects, and nothing but insects. The sweet fluid of the flowers
attracts great numbers of small flies of various sorts; you can scarcely
look into any sort of flower without finding more or less of them, and
sometimes the flower will be almost black with them. This the
humming-bird knows, and he thrusts in his bill, and throwing out his
slender sticky tongue, he picks up the flies one by one and swallows
them, and that is the way he takes his meals; but the _honey_ is nothing
to him. The next time you see a humming-bird, watch him carefully, and
remember what it is he is gathering.