1798 THE PICARIAN BIRDS 



shading off into golden and then to metallic green; while the sides of the head and 

 throat are black, the under surface of the body pure white, the flanks green, and all 

 but the centre feathers white, with their outer webs grayish. The total length is 

 only four inches. The female is duller in color than the male, and has a green 

 crown, while the sides of the face are dusky, the throat pale buff, and the tail 

 feathers white with a subterminal band of black. The home of this species is in 

 Brazil, where the bird is said to be not uncommon in some portions of the interior, 

 although little is known of its habits. 



This is a very easily -recognized group of humming birds by reason 

 The Coquettes Q thg crested head> and the little spang i ed f r ij ls w hich are very con- 

 spicuous on each side of the neck. Twelve species are known, and the range of 

 the genus extends from Southern Mexico, throughout the greater part of South 

 America to Bolivia and Southern Brazil, but not including Ecuador or Peru. One 

 of the most beautiful species is the tufted coquette (Lophornis ornatui) , which inhab- 

 its the island of Trinidad and the opposite mainland of Venezuela, whence it 

 extends into Guiana. It measures not quite three inches in length, the bill half an 

 inch, and the wing one and six-tenths. The upper surface is of a glittering golden 

 green, with a buffish-white band across the rump; the crest is long and of a dark 

 cinnamon color; the throat is glittering green bordered with cinnamon, and the 

 neck frill is also cinnamon, the feathers tipped with a round spot of glittering 

 green; the abdomen is gray; the sides of the body and under tail coverts shining 

 green, the feathers edged with pale cinnamon; the tail is cinnamon, the lateral 

 feathers broadly, the rest narrowly, edged with golden green externally, and the bill 

 flesh color, with a black tip. Scarcely anything has been recorded of the habits of 

 the coquettes. Of one of the Central- American species (L. helentz} Mr. Salvin writes 

 that its flight is very rapid, and hardly to be followed by the eye as it darts from 

 flower to flower, and its cry is peculiarly shrill, and unlike that of any other 

 humming bird. 



THE SWIFTS 

 Family MlCROPODID^* 



Allied in some respects to the humming birds, and in others to the goat 

 suckers, the swifts are readily distinguished from the former by their short and 

 wide beak, while from the latter they are differentiated by the palate being con- 

 structed after the Passerine type. The short beak is curved toward the tip, and 

 is very broad at the base, so that the gape is of great extent. As in the humming 

 birds, the tail feathers are ten in number; whereas in the swallows, which curiously 

 resemble the swifts in external appearance, there are twelve of these feathers. Of 

 primary quills there are ten, and the secondaries are likewise reduced, their 

 -number never exceeding nine. The breastbone resembles that of the humming 



*This family is commonly known as the Cypselidcz, but as the name Cypselus is a synonym of Micropus, the 

 latter must be taken as the souroe of the family name. 



