150 INTRODUCTION. 



other members, prevents the wings being used to 

 pursue an insect prey, though their great develop- 

 ment is as necessary to the manner in which they 

 feed, by hovering above the beautiful blossoms 

 which afford a sustenance, in part, alike to them 

 and to a host of minute insects ; and also to perform 

 the lengthened migrations which these species are 

 known to undertake annually. In the Sun-birds, 

 or Nectariniadaa, the family which we have now to 

 examine, we see no such extraordinary development 

 of wing, and their legs and feet, or, in other words, 

 their provisions for perching, are equal to those of 

 the majority of the Incessores, and show at once a 

 marked difference between the structure of the same 

 parts in truly fissirostral birds, where they are al- 

 ways extremely weak, comparatively unfitted for 

 perching or settling on the ground ; and where, in 

 fact, they are constructed upon that model which 

 will be least incommodious to the bird in pursuing 

 its prey with rapidity through the air, or in per- 

 forming very long migrations. The nectariferous 

 juices of flowers have also been considered as the 

 chief food of the Sun-birds, at least during certain 

 seasons of the year; but we find the manner of 

 seeking for these to be very different from the 

 hovering flight of the Humming-birds,* the Nec- 

 tariniadae always perching first, and exhibiting 



* Mr. Jerdon states of the purple Sun-bird (C. Mahrattensis, 

 Jerd.), " That it occasionally hovers on the wing before a flower, 

 while extracting the honey, but generally hops or flies rather 

 among the smaller twigs. It feeds partly on the honey ex- 



