560 AVES—CREEPER...HUMMING-BIRD. 
THE CREEPER! 
Is the smallest of European birds, if we except the crested wren, and weighs 
only five drachms. The bill is hooked like a sickle. The upper part of the 
body is variegated with brown and black, and the breast and belly are of 
a silver white. This bird is very common in England, though, from its 
extreme agility in eluding the eye of the spectator, it is less frequently seen 
than other common birds. It feeds upon insects, and builds in the holes of 
trees. The nest is formed of grass, lined with feathers. Along the stems 
of trees it runs readily in every direction. - 
Nearly eighty species, foreign and domestic, have been enumerated of this 
bird. The color of the foreign species is in general olive green. It inhabits 
the Sandwich Islands, and is one of the birds, whose plumage the natives 
make use of for their feathered garments. 

THE HUMMING-BIRD2 

Or this charming little animal there are not less than sixty species, from 
the size of a small wren down to that of a bee. An European could never 
have supposed a bird existing so very small, and yet completely furnished 
with a bill, feathers, wings, and intestines, exactly resembling those of the 
largest kind. A bird not so big as the end of one’s little finger, would pro- 
bably be supposed but a creature of imagination, were it not seen in infinite 
numbers, and as frequent as butterflies ina summer’s day, sporting in the 
fields of America, from flower to flower, and extracting their sweets with its 
little bill. 

1 Certhia familiaris, Lux. The genus Certhia has the bill long, or of medium length, 
more or less curved, triangular, compressed, slender; nostrils basal, naked, pierced hori- 
zontally, and half closed by a membrane ; three toes before, the outer united at its base to 
the intermediate one; claws much hooked, that on the hind toe longest; tail graduated 
with stiff pomted shafts; fourth quill feather longest. 
2The genus T'rochilus which embraces the humming-bird, has the bill Jong, straight, or 
arcuated, tubular, very slender, base depressed, acuminated ; upper mandible almost con- 
cealing the lower; tongue long, extensible, bifid, and tubular; nostrils open before, 
covered by a broad membrane; legs very short; tarsus shorter than the middle toe the 
three anterior toes nearly divided; wings graduated, the first feather longest. 
ribes 
