CHAPTER XII 



HUMMINGBIRDS 



No one should quite believe in hummingbirds 

 until he has seen one. Only recently have I be- 

 come convinced of active volcanos and the home 

 life of coral reefs, but I am still skeptical as to the 

 rings of Saturn and not wholly persuaded that 

 mammoths are to be found frozen in the ice of 

 glaciers. \Miile I have a passionate interest in 

 these, so far, unseen things, yet by leavening this 

 with a small secret doubt, I keep at fever heat the 

 desire to see them for myself — making of such 

 personal contact a future necessity. 



It is, I find, eminently satisfying to cultivate an 

 opinion of equal confidence in fairies and in 

 Eskimos — thus insuring perpetual interest in 

 Pook's Hill, Greenland and Mluna. Many people 

 who scoff at such a credo, voice their unconscious 

 allegiance in exclamations such as "It is too won- 

 derful to believe ! " — which is only what I am trying 

 to say of a hummingbird. 



You and I are very wonderful beings, yet we 

 (or at least you) would be complete failures if 

 featured in a side show of a circus. We should 

 have to be terribly stout, or frightfully emaciated, 

 or inconceivably dwarfed to be allowed to sit 



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