HUMMING BIRD. 119 
which I put into a wire cage, and placed in a retired, shaded part of 
the room. After fluttering about for some time, the weather being un- 
commonly cool, it clung by the wires, and hung in a seemingly torpid 
state for a whole forenoon. No motion whatever of the lungs could 
be perceived, on the closest inspection, though, at other times, this is 
remarkably observable; the eyes were shut; and, when touched by 
the finger, it gave no signs of life or motion. I carried it out to the 
open air, and placed it directly in the rays of the sun, in a sheltered 
situation. In a few seconds, respiration became very apparent; the 
bird breathed faster and faster, opened its eyes, and began to look 
about, with as much seeming vivacity as ever. After it had complete- 
ly recovered, I restored it to liberty; and it flew off to the withered 
top of a pear-tree, where it sat for some time dressing its disordered 
plumage, and then shot off like a meteor. 
The flight of the Humming Bird, from flower to flower, greatly re- 
sembles that of a bee, but is so much more rapid, thac the latter ap- 
pears a mere loiterer to him. He poises himself on wing, while he 
thrusts his long, slender, tubular tongue into the flowers in search of 
food. He sometimes enters a room by the window, examines the 
bouquets of flowers, and passes out by the opposite door or window. 
He has been known to take refuge in a hot-house during the cool 
nights of autumn, to go regularly out in the morning, and to return as 
regularly in the evening, for several days together. 
he Humming Bird has, hitherto, been supposed to subsist alto- 
gether on the honey, or liquid sweets, which it extracts from flowers, 
One or two curious observers have, indeed, remarked, that they have 
found evident fragments of insects in the stomach of this species; but 
these have been generally believed to have been taken in by accident. 
The few opportunities which Europeans have to determine this point 
by observations made on the living bird, or by dissection of the newly- 
killed one, have rendered this mistaken opinion almost general in Eu- 
rope. For myself, I can speak decisively on this subject: I have seen 
the Humming Bird, for half an hour at a time, darting at those little 
groups of insects that dance in the air in a fine summer evening, 
retiring to an adjoining twig to rest, and renewing the attack with 
a dexterity that sets all our other Flycatchers at defiance. I have 
opened, from time to time, great numbers of these birds; have exam- 
ined the contents of the stomach with suitable glasses, and, in three 
cases out of four, have found these to consist of broken fragments of 
msects. In many subjects, entire insects of the coleopterous class, 
but very small, were found unbroken. The observations of Mr. Coffer, 
as detailed above, and the remarks of my worthy friend Mr. Peale, are 
corroborative of these facts. It is well known that the Humming 
Bird is particularly fond of tubular flowers, where numerous small in- 
sects of this kind resort to feed on the farina, &c.; and there is every 
reason for believing that he is as often in search of these insects as of 
honey, and that the former compose at least as great a portion of his 
usual sustenance as the latter. If this food be so necessary for the 
parents, there is no doubt but the young also occasionally partake of it. 
To enumerate all the flowers of which this little bird is fond, would 
be to repeat the names of half our American Flora. From the blos- 
soms of the towering poplar or tulip-tree, through a thousand imter- 
