GUACHARO 395 



examples obtained by Bonpland, on the visit of those two travellers, 

 in September 1799, to a cave near Carip6 (at that time a monastery 

 of Aragonese Capuchins) in the Venezuelan province of Cumana on 

 the northern coast of South America. A few years later it was 

 discovei'ed, says Latham {Gen. Hist. Birds, 1823, vii. p. 365), to 

 inhabit Trinidad, where it appears to bear the name of Diablotin ; ^ 

 and much more recently, by the receipt of specimens procured at 

 Sarayacu in Ecuador, Caxamarca in the Peruvian Andes, and 

 Antioquia in New Grenada {Proc. Zool. Soc. 1878, pp. 139, 140; 

 1879, p. 532), its range has been shewn to be much greater than 

 had been supposed. The singularity of its structure, its curious 

 habits, and its peculiar economical value have naturally attracted 

 no little attention, and it has formed the subject of investigation 

 by a considerable number of zoologists both British and foreign. 

 First referring it to the genus Caprimulgus, its original describer 

 soon saw that it was no true Nightjar. It was subsequently 

 separated as forming a subfamily, and has at last been regarded as 

 the type of a distinct Family, Stcatornithidx — a view which, though 

 not put forth till 1870 {Zool. Becord, vi. p. 67), seems now to be 

 generally accepted. Its systematic position, however, can scarcely 

 be considered settled, for though on the whole its predominating 

 alliance may be with the Capimulgidx, nearly as much affinity may 

 be traced to the Striges, while it possesses some characters in 

 which it differs from both {Proc. Zool. Soc. 1873, pp. 526-535). 

 About as big as a Crow, its plumage exhibits the blended tints of 

 chocolate-colour and grey, barred and pencilled with dark brown or 

 black, and spotted in places with white, that prevail in the two 

 groups just named. The beak is hard, strong, and deeply 

 notched, the nostrils are prominent, and the gape is furnished with 

 twelve long hairs on each side. The legs and toes are compara- 

 tively feeble, but the wings are large. In habits the Guacharo is 

 wholly nocturnal, slumbering by day in deep and dark caverns 

 which it frequents in vast numbers. Towards evening it arouses 

 itself, and, with croaking and clattering that has been likened to 

 that of castanets, it approaches the exit of its retreat, whence at 

 nightfall it issues in search of its food, which, so far as is known, 

 consists entirely of oily nuts or fruits, belonging especially to the 

 genera Achras, Aiphanas, Laurus, and Psichotria, some of them sought, 

 it would seem, at a very great distance, for M. Funck {Bull. Acad. 

 Sc. Bruxelles, xi. pt. 2, pp. 371-377) states that in the stomach of 

 one he obtained at Caripe he found the seed of a tree which he 

 believed did not grow nearer than 80 leagues. The hard, in- 

 digestible seeds swallowed by the Guacharo are found in quantities 

 on the floor and the ledges of the caverns it frequents, where many 



^ Not to be confounded with the bird so called in the French Antilles, which 

 is a Petkel, (Estrelata hassitata (see Extekmination, p. 227, note 4). 



