BENEATH TROPIC SEAS 



So, with all the other labor, she must find and tear 

 off lichens, — a dozen, twenty, each to her as large 

 as a barrel head to us, and with straps and bands 

 of cobweb, glue them fast to the outside of the nest. 

 And when we thus have noted the great need 

 implied in this additional work, we recall that in 

 California, the black-chinned hummingbird — blood 

 sister to the ruby-throat — thrives and multiplies 

 in nests, which, lichenless, appear like tiny yellow 

 sponges on the tree. We cross out then our new- 

 found law, confess our ignorance, and marvel all 

 the more. 



From the gathering of the first bit of down to 

 the flight of the second nestling occupies about 

 five weeks. The beautiful symmetry of the two 

 pearly eggs is destroyed about the fourteenth day, 

 when they are replaced by a pair of changelings — 

 two helpless blobs, two black and shriveled things 

 which might well be awful maggots, horrors to be 

 pitched out, twin Calabans come to curse the gentle 

 mother for some dreadful pre-natal crime. She 

 accepts the two awful beings for what they are, 

 although if we watch closely, we see one day 

 what appears to be crime compounded upon 

 crime. She returns to the nest like a shooting 

 spark from a rocket, and alights on the rim with 

 the impact of a drifting thistledown. Before we 

 realize her intention she raises her sword-like bill 

 on high. At the same instant, both of the pul- 

 sating lumps stretch upward — perhaps a plea for 

 mercy, begging at least for the boon of life. The 



176 



