THE BIKDS OF THE TROPICAL FOEESTS. 69 



the white egrette flutters along before the boat, rests, and then 

 again rises for a new career. 



Yet pick out even the liveliest of these privileged spots where 

 the most gorgeous flowers of the tropics expand their glowing 

 petals, and for every scene of this kind we may find another at 

 home of equal beauty and with an equal amount of brilliant 

 colour. 



' Look at a field of buttercups and daisies,' says Mr. Wallace, 

 a very competent judge, 'a hill- side covered with gorse and 

 broom, a mountain rich with purple heather, or a forest glade 

 azure with a carpet of wild hyacinths, and they will bear a 

 comparison with any scene the tropics can produce. I have 

 never seen anything more glorious than an old crab-tree in full 

 blossom, and the horse-chestnut, lilac, and laburnum will vie 

 with the choicest tropical trees and shrubs. In the tropical 

 waters are no more beautiful plants than our white and yellow 

 water lilies, our irises and flowering rush, for I cannot con- 

 sider the flower of the Victoria Eegia more beautiful than that 

 of the Nymphaea alba, though it may be larger, nor is it so 

 abundant an ornament of the tropical waters as the latter is 

 of ours. ' 



Let us, therefore, unseduced by the highly coloured state- 

 ments of travellers, learn to be contented with the beauties 

 which Nature has lavished on our woods and fields, nor deem 

 that England — 



' Where lawns extend that scorn Arcadian pride, 

 And brighter streams than famed Hydaspes glide ' — '■ 



has received but a step -motherly share in the distribution of 

 her gifts. 



Like the ocean, the forest has its voices, now swelling into 

 uproar, now subsiding into silence ; but while the wind and the 

 breaker are the only musicians of the sea, the woods resound 

 with animal voices. 



In general, the morning hours are the loudest; for the creatures 

 that delight in daylight, though not more numerous than the 

 nocturnal species, have generally a louder voice. Their full 

 concert, however, does not begin immediately after sunrise ; 

 for they are mostly so chilled by the colder night, that they 

 need to be warmed for some time before awakening to the 



