THE HUMMING BIRDS. 



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the small insects found there, and not for the nectar. In dozens, and perhaps hundreds, of 

 common flower-frequenting species which I have examined, the crop, stomach, and intestines have 

 been filled with minute beetles, ants, and spiders, which abound in most flowers in South America. 

 Very rarely indeed have I found a trace of honey or of any liquid in the crop or stomach. The 

 flowers they most frequent are the various species of Inga and the papilionaceous flowers of many 

 large forest trees. I have never seen them at the bignonias, or any flowers but those which grow 

 in large masses, covering a whole tree or shrub, as they visit perhaps a hundred flowers in a 

 minute and never stop at a single one. The little Emerald Hummer I have seen in gardens 

 and at the common orange (Asclejrias), which often covers large spaces of waste ground in the 

 ti'opics. But there are many, such as Phaethornis eremita and some lai'ger allied species, which. I 



COMMON' TOPAZ HUMMING BIRD. 



have never seen at flowers. These inhabit the gloomy forest-shades, where they dart aboiit 

 among the foliage; and I have distinctly observed them visit in rapid succession every leaf 

 on a branch, balancing themselves vertically in the air, passing their beak closely over the under 

 surface of each leaf, and thus capturing, no doubt, any small insects that may be upon them. 

 While doing this, the two long feathers of the tail have a vibrating motion, apparently serving as 

 a rudder to assist them in performing the delicate operation. I have seen others searching up 

 and down stems and dead sticks in the same manner, every now and then picking off something, 

 exactly as a Bush Shrike or Tree Creeper does, with this exception, that the Humming-bird 

 is continually on the wing. They also capture insects in the true Fissirostral fashion. How often 

 may they be seen perched on the dead twig of a lofty tree the station that is chosen by 

 the tyrant Flycatchers and the Jacamars from which, like those birds, they dart off a short 

 distance, and after a few whirls and balancings return to the identical twig they had left. In the 

 evening, too, just after sunset, when the Goatsuckers are beginning their search after insects over the 



