EUTOXERES. 315 
Supra saturate nitenti-viridis, pileo obscuriore, uropygio czruleo tincto hoc fulvo limbato: subtus nigrescens, 
gutturis plumis medialiter pallide cervinis, abdominis albis ; cauda viridi-brunnea, apice alba: rostro nigro, 
mandibula ad basin flava. Long. tota 5:3, alee 3-0, caudee 2°3, rostri a rictu 1-2. 
Q mari similis. (Descr. maris et femine ex Calovevora, Panama. Mus. nostr.) 
Hab. Costa Rica, Turrialba (Arcé"), Rovalo ( Warszewiez 1); Panama, Belen (Merritt *), 
Chitra, Calovevora °, Calobre (Arcé). 
This remarkable bird is found in many parts of Western Panama, and thence north- 
wards to the lowlands of Costa Rica lying on the Atlantic slope of the Cordillera. It 
is apparently absent from the line of the Panama Railway, but two closely allied forms 
occur in South America—one in Colombia, the other in Ecuador. 
‘The presence of this species in the State of Panama was first detected by Dr. Merritt, 
who observed it in the district of Belen, where he obtained several specimens, which he 
sent to Mr. Lawrence accompanied with the following note :—“ It was as near as I can 
recollect during the month of September, 1852, that I saw for the first time and 
obtained a specimen of this (to me) curious and novel bird. I was at that time 
stationed in the mountainous district of Belen, province of Veraguas, New Granada. 
“My attention at that particular time was directed towards the collection of 
specimens of the Humming-Bird family. One day while out hunting a short distance 
from the camp for these chefs-d’wuvre of nature in the feathered race, I was startled by 
the swift approach of a small object through the close thicket, which darted like a rifle- 
bullet past me, with a loud hum and buzzing of wings. Indeed, it was this great noise 
that accompanied its flight, which being so much greater than I had ever heard before 
from any of these winged meteors of the southern forests, that especially attracted my 
attention as something uncommon. 
“The bird continued its flight but a short distance beyond the spot where I stood, 
when it suddenly stopped in its rapid course directly in front of a flower. There for a 
moment poising itself in this position, it darted upon the flower in a peculiar manner ; 
‘in fact, the movements which now followed of this little creature were exceedingly 
curious to me. Instead of inserting its beak into the calyx by advancing in a direct 
line towards the flower, as customary with this class of birds according to my limited 
observations, this one performed a curvilinear movement, at first stooping forward while 
it introduced its beak into the calyx, and then, when apparently the point of the beak 
had reached the desired locality in the flower, its body suddenly dropped downwards, 
so that it seemed as though it was suspended from the flower by the beak. ‘That this 
was not actually the case, the continued rapid movement of its wings demonstrated 
beyond a doubt. In this position it remained the ordinary length of time, and then by 
performing these movements in the reverse order and direction, it freed itself from the 
flower, and afterwards proceeded to the adjoining one, when the same operation was 
repeated as already described.” 
Dr. Merritt proceeds to describe the flower as that of a“ species of palm, the blossoms 
40* 
