350 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Sept. 



it distinguishes a carcass afar off. He described in fall the 

 appearance of the Condor, remarking that the female is smaller 

 than the male, an unusual circumstance in this order, the 

 feminine eagles and hawks being larger than their mates. 



Professor Orton next spoke of the Humming Bird, of the habits 

 and economy of which our knowledge is very meagre. The 

 relationship between the genera is not clear, and one species is no 

 more typical than another. The only well marked divisions we 

 can discover, are those adopted by Gould and Gray, the Phae- 

 thornithinas and Polytminse. The former are dull colored and 

 frequent the dense forests. They arc more numerous on the 

 Amazon than the other group ; and I know of no specimen from 

 the Quito Valley, or from an altitude above ten thousand feet. 

 Their nest are long, covered with lichens, lined with silk and hung 

 over water courses. The latter comprises the vast majority of 

 the Humming Birds, or nearly nine-tenths. They delight in 

 sunshine, and the males generally are remarkable for tiieir brilliant 

 plumoge. Their head-quarters seem to be near New Granada ; 

 some species are confined to particular volcanoes, or an area of a 

 few miles square. Of the four hundred and thirty known species 

 of Humming Birds, thirty-five are found in and around the valley 

 of Quito, thirty-two on the Pacific slope, and seventeen on the 

 Oriental side of the Andes, making a total of eighty-four, or 

 about one-fifth of the family within the Bepublic of Ecuador. If 

 the wanton destruction of Humming Birds for mere decorative 

 purposes, continues for the next decade, as it has during the last, 

 several genera may become utterly extinct. This is evident when 

 we consider that many a genus is represented by a single species, 

 which species has a very circumscribed habitat, and nmltiplies 

 slowly, producing but two eggs in a year. He noticed one fact in re- 

 gard to the nests of Humming Birds, which he could not explain. 

 Our northern hummer glues lichens all over the outside ; so do a 

 number of species in Brazil, Guiana, etc. But in the valley of 

 Quito moss invariably is used, though lichens abound. A similar 

 variation is seen in the nests of the chimney sw^allow — our species 

 building of twigs glued together with saliva, while its Quito 

 representative builds of mud and moss. The time of incubation 

 at Quito is twelve days, and there is but one brood in a year." 



