Far-away in the forest a singularly loud and clear note, like the sound
of a bell, is heard; mile after mile, and still the same strange note
reaches the ear. A single toll; then a pause for a minute, then a pause
again, then a toll, and again a pause; then for six or eight minutes no
toll is heard; then another comes strangely and solemnly amid the tall
columns and, fretted arches of the sylvan temple. Sometimes of a
morning, and sometimes in the evening, and even when the meridian sun
has silenced all the other songsters of the grove, that strange toll is
heard. At length, high up on the dried top of an aged maura, a
snow-white bird may be seen, no larger than a pigeon; and yet it is the
creature who is uttering those strange sounds. It is another species of
the cotinga--the well-known campanero, or bell-bird. On its forehead
rises a spiral tube nearly three inches long, which is of jet-black,
dotted all over with small white feathers. Having a communication with
the palate, it enables the bird to utter these loud clear sounds. When
thus employed, and filled with air, it looks like a spire; when empty,
it becomes pendulous. Though, like most of its tribe, it is sometimes
seen in flocks, it never feeds with other species of cotingas.
The witty Sydney Smith, remarking on the account Waterton gives of the
campanero, observes: "This single bird then has a voice of more power
than the belfry of a cathedral ringing for a new dean. It is impossible
to contradict a gentleman who has been in the forests of Cayenne; but we
are determined, as soon as a campanero is brought to England, to make
him toll in a public place, and have the distance measured."
Had the witty dean been aware of the fact--stated by the astronomer and
aeronaut, Mr Glaisher--that a female voice is heard a mile further than
that of the most hirsute and sturdy "tar," he might have been less
sceptical of the powers of the little cotinga to make itself heard for
the distance of three miles through the pure and calm air of the
tropics.