166 HUMMING-BIRD HAWK MOTH. 



ribration of the wings is so rapid as to occasion a 

 considerable humming noise, whence it has been 

 termed the Humming-bird Hawk-moth. The fol- 

 lowing is an agreeable and accurate account of its 

 manners : " The Humming-bird Hawk-moth visits 

 us annually, and occasionally in some numbers, 

 frisking about all the summer long, and in very 

 line seasons continues with us as late as the second 

 week in October. The vigilance and animation of 

 this creature are surprising, and seem to equal those 

 of its namesake, the splendid meteoric bird of the 

 tropics, ' that winged thought,' as some one has 

 called it; though our plain and dusky insect can 

 boast none of its glorious hues. Our little sphinx 

 appears chiefly in the mornings and evenings of the 

 day, rather avoiding the heat of the mid-day sun, 

 possibly aroused from its rest by the scent, that 

 ' aromatic soul of flowers,' which is principally 

 exhaled at these periods ; delighting in the jasmine, 

 marvel of Peru, phlox, and such tubular flowers ; 

 and it will even insert its long, flexible tube into 

 every petal of the carnation, to extract the honey- 

 like liquor it contains. It will visit our geraniums 

 and greenhouse plants, and, whisking over part of 

 them with contemptuous celerity, select some com- 

 posite flower that takes its fancy, and examine every 

 tube with rapidity, hovering over its disk with 

 quivering wings, while its fine hawk-like eyes 

 survey all surrounding dangers. The least move- 

 ment alarms it, and it darts away with the speed of 

 an arrow ; yet returns, and with suspicious vigilance 



