SOME QUEER RELATIONS 155 



that minister to his needs, many that have been brought 

 from the ends of the earth to our garden plots please him 

 no less. The canna, nasturtium, phlox, trumpet-flower, 

 salvia, and a host of others, delight his eye and his 

 palate, so that it is well worth while to plant his favorites 

 in our gardens if only for the joy of seeing him about. 

 He is wonderfully neighborly, coming to the flower-beds 

 or window-boxes for small insects as well as nectar, with 

 undaunted familiarity in the presence of the family. 

 The little bird is not always so amiable by any means. A 

 fierce duellist, he will lunge his rapier-like bill at another 

 hummer with deadly thrusts. A battle of the squeaking 

 midgets in mid-air is a sorry sight. 



You may know a male by the brilliant metallic-red 

 feathers on his throat. His mate lacks these, but her 

 briUiancy has another outlet, for she is one of the most 

 expert nest builders in the world. An exquisitely dainty 

 little cup of plant down, felted into a compact cradle and 

 stuccoed with bits of lichen bound on by spider web, can 

 scarcely be told from a knot on the limb to which it is 

 fastened. Two eggs, not larger than beans, in time give 

 place to two downy hummers about the size of honey-bees. 

 Perhaps you have seen pigeons pump food down the 

 throats of their squabs? In this same way are baby hum- 

 ming-birds fed. After about three weeks in the nest, the 

 young are ready to fly; but they rest on perches the first 

 month of their independence more than at any time 

 afterward. No weak-footed relative of the swift could live 

 long oflf the wing. It is godd-bye to summer when the 

 last humming-bird forsakes our frost-nipped northern 

 gardens for happier hunting grounds far away. 



