The QUESAL, or RESPLENDENT TROGON (_Calurus paradiseus_, or _C.
resplendens_), the most magnificent of all these beautiful birds, is
adorned with a helmet-like crest, and possesses a most extraordinary
development of the feathers on the shoulders, which droop over the wings
and tail. The mantle and upper breast are of a brilliant, golden green.
The under side is bright carmine-red. The eye is deep nut-brown, the
eyelid black, the beak yellow, with a brownish base; the foot brownish
yellow. The female has a smaller crest, and the long feathers in her tail
scarcely exceed the other tail-feathers in length. In both sexes the head,
throat, and upper breast are dark green; the back, shoulders, and upper
tail-covers light green; and the lower breast and belly greyish brown.
The rump is bright red, the centre tail-feathers are black, those at the
exterior white, marked with black. The length of the body is sixteen
inches; the wing measures eight inches and one-third, and the tail eight
inches and a half. The longest feathers in the male bird's tail exceed the
rest by twenty-five inches.
[Illustration: QUESALS, OR RESPLENDENT TROGONS (_Calurus paradiseus_, or
_C. resplendens_).]
The Quesal inhabits Mexico and Central America; and, according to Salvia,
is met with in all such woods and forests as are at a height of about
6,000 feet above the level of the sea. In these situations it leads a
quiet and dreamy existence, perching lazily in the trees, and scarcely
exerting itself to do more than slowly turn its head from side to side, or
raise and waft its graceful, drooping plumes. Only in the air, however,
is the beauty of the Quesal seen in its full perfection; and as it
floats rapidly but gently along, with feathery train outspread, those
who have witnessed its elegant movements will admit that amongst all the
inhabitants of the Western Hemisphere it is without a rival. The voice of
this bird is capable of producing a great variety of sounds; the principal
note, however, is a piping tone, which commences softly, and gradually
swells into a loud but not unpleasing cry. Fruit and insects appear
to form its principal means of subsistence. We learn from Owen that he
found a Quesal's eggs deposited in a hollow tree, about six feet from the
ground. Salvia is of opinion that the male does not assist in the work of
incubation.
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