WIDE EAXGE OF THE IIUMMIXG-BIRD. 



hovering for an instant before you, as if to give you an oppor- 

 tunity of admiring its surpassing beauty, and now again 

 vanishing witli the rapidity of thouglit. But do not fancy that 

 tliese winged jewels of the air, buzzing like bees round the 

 l)lossoms less gorgeous than themselves, live entirely on the 

 honey-dew collected within their petals ; for on opening the 

 stomach of a humming-bird, dead insects are almost always 

 found there, which its long and slender beak, and cloven ex- 

 tensile tongue, like that of the woodpecker, enable it to catch 

 at the very bottom of the tubular corollas. 



The torrid zone is the chief seat of the Humming-birds, but 

 in summer tliey wander far beyond its bounds, and follow the 



SAWBILL IIIMMING BIRD. BltAZIUAN WOOD NYMril. 



WIIITE-PIDED HILL STAR. 



k 



sun in his annual declensions to the poles. Thus, in the north, 

 they appear as flying visitors on the borders of the Canadian 

 lakes, and on the southern coast of the peninsula of Aljaschka ; 

 while in the southern hemisphere they roam as far as Patagonia, 

 and even as Tierra del Fuego ; visiting in the northern hemi- 

 sphere the confines of the walrus, and reaching in the south the 

 regions of the penguin and the lion-seal ; advancing towards 



