366 NATURAL HISTORY. 



climbing Picarice, where the fourth toe is permanently or temporarily turned backwards as well as 

 the first. The skin of these birds is remarkably thin and tender, so that their preparation is by no 

 means an easy matter, and their appearance is also detracted from by a scantiness of plumage on 

 the nape, where a great want of feathers takes place. Mr. Wallace, writing of the birds of this 

 present family, remarks : " As an instance how totally unable the Trogons are to use their feet 

 for anything like climbing, we may mention that the Trogons of South America feed principally 

 on fruit, which one would think they would get by climbing or walking after, if they could. But 

 no ; they take their station on a bare branch about the middle of the tree, and having fixed their 

 attention on some particularly tempting fruit, they dart at it, seize it dexterously on the wing, 

 and return to their original seat. Often, while waiting under a fruit-tree for Chatterers or Pigeons, 

 have we received the first intimation of the presence of a Trogon by the whir-r-r of its wings as it 

 dai'ted after a fruit. It is curious that this habit seems confined to the Trogons of America. In 

 the East I have never yet observed it, and in the numerous specimens I have opened, nothing has 

 been found but insects. The African Trogons also appear to be wholly insectivorous." 



Again, in his "Naturalist in Nicaragua" (p. 122) Mr. Belt writes : "The Trogons are general 

 feeders. I have taken from their crops the remains of fruits, grasshoppers, beetles, termites, and 

 ven small crabs and land shells. The largest species, the Massena Trogon. (Trogon massena), is one 

 foot in length, dark bronze-green above, with the smaller wing-feathers speckled white and black, and 

 the belly of a beautiful carmine. Sometimes it sits on a branch above where the army of ants are 

 foraging below, and when a grasshopper or other large insect flies up and alights on a leaf it darts 

 after it, picks it up, and returns to its perch. I sometimes found them breaking into the nests of 

 the termites with their strong bills, and eating the large soft- bodied workers, and it was from 

 the crop of this species that I took the remains of a small crab and land shell (Helicina). They 

 take short, quick, jerking flights, and are often met with along with flocks of other birds Fly- 

 catchers, Tanagers, Creepers, Woodpeckers, &c., that hunt together, traversing the forests in flocks 

 of hundreds, belonging to more than a score of different species, so that while they are passing over 

 the trees seem alive with them. Mr. Bates has mentioned similar gregarious flocks met with by 

 him in Brazil ; and I never went any distance into the woods around St. Domingo without seeing 

 them. The reason of their association together may be partly for protection, as no rapacious bird 

 or mammal could approach the flock without being discovered by one or other of them ; but the prin- 

 cipal reason appears to be that they play into each other's hands in their search for food. Creepers 

 and Woodpeckers and others drive the insects out of their hiding-places under bark, amongst moss 

 and withered leaves. The Flycatchers sit on branches and fly after the larger insects, the Flycatchers 

 taking them on the wing, the Trogons from the leaves on which they have settled." 



THE LONG-TAILED TROGON, OR QUESAL (Pharomacrus* mocinno). 



This beautiful species is mentioned in Wiliughby's Ornithology, which was published some 

 two hundred years ago, in which book an appendix is devoted to such birds as the author suspected 

 to be "fabulous;" and the Quetzaltototl of Hernandez was placed in this category, nor was it till the 

 French traveller Delattre visited Guatemala, and published his account of the habits of the bird in 

 1843, that it was restored to its proper position as one of the most beautiful of the feathered ttibe : 

 it is now by no means rare in collections. The best account of the habits of this species and, indeed, 

 of any Trogon is that given by Mr. Osbert Salvin, in his paper entitled " Quesal-shooting in Vera 

 Paz,"t in Guatemala. He writes from his diary : " Off to the mountains at last, with a fine day and 

 a fair prospect of success. The road, after crossing the river, strikes off to the northward a mountain 

 track winding among the hills. Soon after entering the forest, a river crosses the path a foaming 

 torrent a fall into which gives no hope of escape. A felled tree, one of the largest of the forest, 

 forms the bridge, over which, slippery with rnoss and foam, we have to pass. For ourselves it is 

 nothing; but I must say I tremble for the Indians, each of whom carries his 751bs. of cargo. In the 

 worst and most slippery part, the foothold is somewhat improved by the tree being notched with a 

 ' machete ; ' but still it is as dangerous a pass as I ever crossed. After half-an-hour's delay, we reach 

 the other bank. One ' mozo ' only turned faint-hearted, and another carried his pack across. From 



* 0apo, a mantle ; uoucpds, large. f Ibis, 1861, p. 138. 



