VERVAIN HUMMING-BIRD. 129 



ornithological friend, who has seen it, that it is no 

 larger than the species of the old naturalists. Under 

 these considerations, Lesson's name being manifestly 

 misapplied, I have ventured to give to the present 

 species a new appellation, derived from its habit of 

 buzzing over the low herbaceous plants of pastures, 

 which our other species do not. The West Indian 

 vervain (Stachytarphetd) is one of the most common 

 weeds in neglected pastures, shooting up everywhere 

 its slender columns, set round with blue flowers, to 

 the height of a foot. About these our little Humming- 

 bird is abundant during the summer months, probing 

 the azure blossoms a few inches from the ground. 

 It visits the spikes in succession, flitting from one to 

 another, exactly in the manner of the honey-bee, 

 and with the same business-like industry and ap- 

 plication. In the winter, the abundance of other 

 flowers and the paucity of vervain-blossoms, induce 

 its attentions to the hedgerows and woods. 



I have sometimes watched, with much delight, 

 the evolutions of this little species at the moringa 

 tree already spoken of. When only one is present, 

 he pursues the round of the blossoms soberly enough, 

 sucking as he goes, and now and anon sitting quietly 

 on a twig. But if two are about the tree, one will 

 fly off, and, suspending himself in the air a few yards 

 distant, the other presently shoots off to him, and 

 then, without touching each other, they mount 

 upward with a strong rushing of wings, perhaps 

 for five hundred feet. Then they separate, and each 

 shoots diagonally towards the ground, like a ball 

 from a rifle, and wheeling round, comes up to the 



G 5 



