756 



THE NATURALIST ON THE RIVER AMAZONS. 



their appearance suddenly iu the dry forest 

 near Ega, ia large flocks, probably assem- 

 blages of birds gathered together from the 

 neighboring Ygapo forests, which are then 

 flooded and cold. The birds hare now be- 

 come exceedingly tame, and the troops travel 

 with heavy laborious flight from bough to 

 bough among the lower trees. They thus 

 become an easy prey to hunters, and every 

 one at Ega who can get a gun of any sort and 

 a few charges of powder and shot, or a 

 blow-pipe, goes daily to the woods to kill a 

 few brace for dinner ; for, as already ob- 

 served, the people of Ega live almost exclu- 

 sively on stewed and roasted Toucans dining 

 the months of June and July, the birds being 

 then very fat, and the meat exceedingly 

 sweet and tender. 



No one pu seeing a Toucan can help ask- 

 ing what is the use of the enormous bill, 

 which, in some species, attains a length of 

 seven inches, and a width of more than two 

 inches. A few remarks on this subject may 

 be here introduced. The early naturalists 

 having seen only the bill of a Toucan, which 

 was esteemed as a marvellous production by 

 the virtuosi of the sixteenth and seventeenth 

 centuries, concluded that the bird must have 

 belonged to the aquatic and web-footed 

 order, as this contains so many species of re- 

 markable development of beak, adapted for 

 seizing fish. Some travelers also related 

 fabulous stories of Toucans resorting to the 

 banks of rivers to feed on fish, and these ac- 

 counts also encouraged the erroneous views 

 of the habits of the birds which for a long 

 time prevailed. Toucans, however, are now 

 well known to be eminently arboreal birds, 

 and to belong to a group (including trogons, 

 parrots, and barbets ), all of whose members 

 are fruit-eaters. On the Amazons, where 

 these birds are very common, no one pre- 

 tends ever to have seen a Toucan walking on 

 the ground in its natural state, much less 

 acting the part of a swimming or wading 

 bird. Professor Owen found, on dissection, 

 that the gizzard in Toucans is not so well 

 adapted for the trituration of food as it is in 

 other vegetable feeders, and concluded, there- 

 fore, as Broderip had observed the habit of 

 chewing the cud in a tame bird, that the 

 great toothed bill was useful in holding and 

 re-masticating the food. The bill can 

 scarcely be said to be a very good contriv- 

 ance for seizing and crushing small birds, or 

 taking them from their nests in crevices of 

 trees, habits which have been imputed to 

 Toucans by some writers. The hollow, cel- 

 lular structure of the interior of the Mil, its 

 curved and clumsy shape, and the deficiency 

 of force and precision when it is used to seize 

 objects, suggest a want of fitness, if this be 

 the function of the member. But fruit is 

 undoubtedly the chief food of Toucans, and 

 it is in reference to their mode of obtaining 

 it that the use of their uncouth bills is to be 

 Bought. 



Flowers and fruit on the crowns of the 

 large trees of South American forests grow 

 principally toward the end of slender twigs* 



which will not bear any considerable weight ^ 

 all atiim Us, therefore, which feed upon food, 

 or on insects contained in flowers, must, of 

 course, hare some means of reaching the? 

 ends of the stalks from a distance. Monkty* 

 obtain their fool by stretching forth their 

 long arms, and, ia some instances, their tails,, 

 to bring the fruit near to their mouths.. 

 Humming-birds are endowed with highly- 

 perfected organs of flight, with correspond- 

 ing muscular development, by which they 

 are enabled to sustain themselves on the wing, 

 before blossoms while rifling them of their 

 contents. These (strong-flying creatures,, 

 however, will, whenever they can get near 

 enough, remain on their perches while prob- 

 ing neighboring flowers for insects. Trogons- 

 have feeble wings, and a dull, inactive tem- 

 peiament. Their mode of obtaining food is- 

 to station themselves quietly on low branches^ 

 in the gloomy shades of the forest, and eye- 

 the fruits on the surrounding trees, darting, 

 off as if with an effort every time they wish 

 to seize a mouthful, and returning to the- 

 same perch. Barbets (Capitoninse) seem U> 

 have no especial endowment, either of habits^ 

 or structure, to enable them to seize fruits 

 and in this respect they are similar to the 

 Toucans, if we leave the bill out of question, 

 both tribes having heavy bodies, with feeble- 

 organs of flight, so that they are disabled 

 from taking their food on the wing. The 

 purpose of the enormous bill here becomes, 

 evident. It is to enable the Toucan to reach 

 and devour fruit while remaining seated, aridi 

 thus to counterbalance the disadvantage; 

 which its heavy body and gluttonous appe- 

 tite would otherwise give it in the competi- 

 tion with allied groups of birds. The rela- 

 tion between the extraordinarily lengthened 

 bill of the Toucan and its mode of obtaining: 

 food, is therefore precisely similar to that be- 

 tween the long neck and lips of the Giraffe- 

 and the mode of browsing of the animal. 

 The bill of the Toucan can scarcely be con- 

 sidered a very perfectly-formed instrument 

 for the end to which it is applied, as here ex- 

 plained ; but nature appears not to invent 

 organs at once for the functions to which 

 they are now adapted, but avails herself, 

 here of one already-existing structure or in- 

 stinct, there of another, according as they 

 are handy when need for their further modi- 

 fication arises. 



One day while walking along the principal' 

 pathway in the woods near Ega, I saw on& 

 of these Toucans seated gravely on a low~ 

 branch close to the road, and had no difficulty 

 iu seizing it with my hand. It turned out to 

 be a runaway pet bird ; no one, however,, 

 came to own it, although I kept it in my 

 house for several months. The bird was ia 

 a half-starved and sickly condition, but after 

 a few days of good living it recovered healthi 

 and spirits, and became one of the most, 

 amusing pets imaginable. Many excellent 

 accounts of the habits of tame Toucans have 

 been published, and therefore I need not de- 

 scribe them in detail, but I do not recollect 

 . to have seen any notice of their intelligence 



