FAUNA OF ECUADOE. 243 



where the atmosphere has ah-eady lost half of its weight. If the Chilian condor 

 descends to the coast, its congener of the Ecuadorean Andes is scarcely seen below 

 8,850 feet, and even dies if brought in captivity down to the sea. 



On the other hand Whymper never met the condor higher than 15,000 feet ; 

 it hovers over the pastures usually at about 1,500 feet from the ground, maintain- 

 ing itself by nearly imperceptible movements of the wing, and scarcely'' ever 

 attacking any but young animals or those enfeebled by age, calves, old horses 

 and the like. 



The eastern forests harbour a great variety of birds, which have mostly a very 

 limited range, often depending for their existence on a single species of flower or 

 fruit. Most of the humming-birds, even on the uplands, are thus confined to 

 very small areas. Wagner mentions one species which occurs only at the altitude 

 of 13,780 feet on the slopes of Pichincha, while a closely related variety is found 

 only on Chimborazo between the same altitude and the lower limit of perpetual 

 snow. An ibis {theridicus caudatm) is the characteristic bird of Antisana, and 

 the flautero ("flute-player'"), endowed with a marvellously correct musical note, 

 is restricted to the eastern forests. 



The habits of various species have also been modified by their different envi- 

 ronments. Thus on the Amazonian slope of the Rio Napo the bananas of Baeza, 

 planted at an elevation of 7,8S0 feet at the foot of cliffs well exposed to the solar 

 heat, suffer much from the ravages of a vampire {thijroptera hicolor), which pene- 

 trates into the terminal flower and absorbs its sap.* The chief obstacle to the 

 settlement of the Amazonian slope is the multitude of bats {phijlostoma spectrum), 

 which attack both man and beast. Many of the children die of exhauslion from 

 the attacks made on them while asleep by these blood-sucking vampires. In 

 these eastern forests the reptiles are represented by innumerable species of 

 snakes, which, however, are nowhere met higher than about 13,000 feet on the 

 plateaux. 



The originality of the local f juna appears especially in the lower organisms, 

 notably the insects, most of which are also confined to very narrow ranges, 

 several being found only on certain mountains. Whymper discovered on Pic- 

 hincha no less than twenty-one new species of beetles, eight of whic-h have been 

 met nowhere else. Ecuador has altogether as many as 8,000 known species of 

 coleoptera. The coHas aUicola butterfly flits upwards to the neighbourhood of the 

 snow-line, although never seen on the lower slopes of the mountains. 



On the plateaux the streams and meres at the great altitude of 14,600 feet 

 present only a single species of fish, the prenadilla (p/inelodes or eyclopUini ct/clopum). 

 The natives, no doubt, speak of others inhabiting the upland basins, but naturalists 

 have hitherto failed to discover them. Even the reports current on the subject of 

 the prenadilla, accepted in good faith by Humboldt, have been questioned by recent 

 zoologists. They are said especially to inhabit tlie deep waters concealed in the 

 cavities of the volcanoes, and during the «ruptions of Imbabura ('' Fish Moun- 

 tain ") in 1691, of Carihuairazo in 1698, and of Tunguragua in 1797, myriads are 

 * All red Simson, Travels in the Wilds of Ecuador. 



