108 TROPICAL WILD LIFE IN BRITISH GUIANA 



ined any stranger and commented on all his doings. Others 

 iroze motionless until one had passed from view ; others flew 

 at once to the tree-tops or to some distant safer part of the 

 jungle. 



Still other groups exhibited a sexual distinction and in 

 considering them as protected or unprotected I had to con- 

 sider the rights of both males and females. These gave add- 

 ed emphasis to the correctness of my theory of protective 

 coloring, for the actions of the two sexes were in perfect 

 accord with their diversity in coloration. It was an easy 

 matter to creep beneath a tree where a female or young male 

 bellbird was calling. Natural selection or whatever we may 

 call it, has striped the plumage green, and with such a pro- 

 tection the bird can and does concentrate its whole attention 

 on those mighty utterances. But a snow white male bellbird 

 is too wary for more than a glimpse. Other cotingas, such 

 as the pompadour chatterer and many honey-creepers and 

 tanagers, came under the same class. Manakins, although 

 the frequent invisibility of the parti-colored males demanded 

 their inclusion with the protected birds of the mid- jungle, 

 yet shared this section too, as one saw far more of the females 

 and young males than of the adult cocks, although there was 

 not the slightest reason to think that there was any actual 

 numerical disparity in the sexes. In the open clearing, the 

 grassbirds and finches illustrated the same sexual distinction, 

 and one could measure by yards the facility of close approach 

 to the little drab-colored hens, in comparison to the readiness 

 with which the black, white and chestnut cocks took to wing. 



Omitting hawks, owls, vultures and five piscivorous 

 groups, the remaining forty-eight, in the matter of food, fell 

 into three unequal divisions; twelve per cent were wholly 

 vegetarian, feeding chiefly on nuts, seeds, berries and forest 

 fruits. These were jungle pigeons, ground doves, macaws, 

 parrots, parrakeets and toucans. More than fifty per cent 

 were carnivorous, including both seeds and insects in their 

 diet ; while less than thirty-eight per cent were wholly insec- 



