AXIMALS OF THE SAND-COAST 41 



most conspicuous among the feathered tribes of the coast. A 

 small falcon {Falco sparverius) is likewise often seen, and a 

 small burrowing owl {Athene cunicularia) haunts almost every 

 ruin on the coast. The pearl-owl, performing the useful services 

 of our own barn-owl {Strix perlatd), is protected and encouraged 

 in many plantations, as it thins the ranks of the mice. Swallows 

 are scarce ; nor do they build their nests on the houses, but 

 on solitary walls, far from the habitations of man. 



Among the singing birds, the beautiful crowned fly-catcher 

 {Myoarchus coronatus) is one of the most remarkable. Its 

 head, breast, and belly are of a burning red; its wings and 

 back blackish brown. It always sits upon the highest top of 

 the bushes, flies vertically upwards, whirls about a short time 

 singing in the air, and then again descends in a straight line 

 upon its former resting-place. Some tanagras and parrots, and 

 two starling-like birds, the red-breasted picho and the lustrous 

 black chivillo, that are frequently kept in cages on account of 

 their agreeable song, are found in the coast-valleys ; and various 

 pigeons, among others the neat little turtuli and the more 

 stately cuculi, frequent the neighbourhood of the plantations. 

 The latter has a monotonous but very melodious song, which 

 lasts from early morning to the forenoon, and is again re- 

 sumed towards sunset. It consists in repeating three times the 

 word " cuculi," and resuming the same notes after a shorter or 

 longer pause. Some of the birds repeat more frequently their 

 cuculi, and their value increases in the same proportion. In 

 Cocachacra Tschudi saw a bird that reiterated its note fourteen 

 times consecutively, and was so highly prized by its possessor 

 that he would not sell it for less than two ounces of gold, or 

 thirty-four dollars. 



Among the lizard tribes large and brilliantly green iguanas are 

 found on the southern coast ; but much more frequently dull 

 and sombre agamas lurk among the rocks and stones. Some 

 geckos creep about the houses and walls in the inhabited val- 

 leys ; but it would be vain to seek in the Peruvian oasis for the 

 chameleon, which frequents every desert island of the Sahara. 



Snakes, both venomous and harmless, are in general tolerably 

 rare, and occur both in the fruitful lands and the sand- plains. 



The animated sea-shore forms a striking contrast to the 

 death-like solitude of the interior. Troops of carrion vultures 



