100 OUR FEATHERED FRIENDS. 
We shall never try to have another pet so frail as 
this; these birds seem too delicate to touch. Our fin- 
gers are not light enough. We havea friend who kept 
a young hummer for three months, and they are said to 
live even longer than this when in captivity. 
Of all our bird friends, we think the humming-bird 
the most wonderful and interesting. This perhaps is 
because it is the smallest and wisest of all the birds 
we know. 
CHAPTER? XX. 
HOW WE TOOK THE HUMMING-BIRDS’ PICTURES. 
THERE are seventeen or eighteen kinds of humming- 
birds in the United States. Here in Southern Cali- 
fornia we have five or six. The largest of these is 
the Anna’s Humming-bird.! It was called “ Anna’s 
Hummer” in honor of a lady of that name. 
This bird measures about four inches from the tip of 
its beak to the end of its tail. The female is a mixt- 
ure of gray and green underneath, with a shining 
ereen back. The male has a throat and head of change- 
able bright colors, which shimmer like some metallic 
substance as he turns about in the sunshine. 
The bill of these birds is five-eighths of an inch long, 
and the tongue is much longer. With this long, ex- 
tensible tongue it can suck the honey from the deepest 
1 Calypte annae. 
