140 BEAUTIFUL BIRDS 
the air. His back is all green, and so bright, if only 
you cover up his head and throat. If you don’t cover 
them—or as soon as you uncover them again—you 
hardly seem to see it. It is no brighter then than a 
glow-worm is when a very bright star is shooting 
through the air. 
Now we come to the Splendid Coquette, a little 
bird not half the size of a golden-crested wren, which 
is the smallest bird that we, in this country, know 
anything about, smaller, even, than the common wren. 
He has a crest, too—this little Humming-bird—a 
very fine one of chestnut feathers, not sticking up on 
the top of the head, as so many crests do, but going 
backwards after the head has come to an end, so that 
it makes a little chestnut feather-awning for the neck 
to be under. But just where they spring from the 
head each of these chestnut feathers is black, and at 
their tips, too, they have all a little black spot, and 
this makes them look still prettier than if they were 
all chestnut. When the little bird spreads out this 
fine crest of his, like a fan—for he can do that—all 
the feathers in it stand out separately from each other, 
and then he looks like a little sun in the centre of 
his own rays. 
Yes, a sun, because he is so very bright. He has 
a gorget (or perhaps you would prefer to call it a 
lappet) of feathers on his throat and breast, of the 
