272 ANIMAL ARTISANS 



a dead cariboo deer and a leather-shirted hunter by its 

 side, and labels this " Cariboo-hunting Newfoundland 

 Sport." New Zealand in her stamp designs is ornitho- 

 logically inclined, possibly because more than one of 

 her public men have been great naturalists and have 

 written monumental works on their country's birds. 

 The apteryx is the most interesting survival of the 

 strange wingless fauna of the islands, and is duly com- 

 memorated on the postal issues. So is another bird, 

 apparently a species of mynah, one which is probably 

 well known to New Zealanders. 



But by far the most interesting bird-emblem of 

 a modern state is that of the Republic of Guatemala. 

 It has been adopted as the national crest for so 

 long that (partly through the taste for stamp- 

 collecting) the existence of one of the rarest and 

 most beautiful of the bird -creation has been made 

 far more widely known than it otherwise would have 

 been. There is a race of birds called trogons, most 

 of which have very fine feathers and remarkable 

 colouring. They are found in India and the Malays, 

 but are most numerous in Central and Southern 

 America. It was from their plumage that the 

 Mexicans made their famous mosaics of feather-work ; 

 and from the tail-feathers they made the lustrous green 

 helmets of their kings and nobles. The most gorgeous 

 of all these was the long-tailed or resplendent trogon, 

 which was kept as a sacred or royal bird in the palace 

 of Montezuma, or in one of the two houses which 

 formed the royal menagerie. " One of these houses 

 held birds of prey only ; the other birds of gorgeous 



