that some of the typically 'skulking' tree-top haunters of the tropics are 

 most gaudily 'patched,' more so even than the parrots, and that many of 

 the brightest colored 'high-perchers' spend much time fairly amid the foli- 

 age. But pure leaf-green is the prevailing color of the tree-top foliage haunt- 

 ers, just as rich brown is that of the forest ground birds. Between these two 

 types again there are perfect intermediates. Such is the motmot, with its 

 ground-brown underside, its soft green back, and its black and bright-blue 

 head; such also is the beautiful jacamar, described in Chapter XVI (p. 

 90), and such are some of the dim-colored, low-ranging hummingbirds. 

 The toucans, also, with their great amount of sharply defined black, are best 

 fitted for obliteration in the intermediate woodland realms, where darkly 

 shadowed big branches and tree trunks contrast with sun-spots and gay vis- 

 tas. But they are also tree-top birds, high-perchers, and their vividly patched 

 costumes of course stand them in good stead in these situations also, in spite 

 of the redundant black. This usually covers the head, back, wings and 

 tail; while the underside is marked with big patches of bright color — ^red, 

 orange, yellow, white — sometimes all four together — ^more or less blended into 

 one another, but ending sharply against the black. The huge but almost 

 weightless bill also is brilliantly adorned with yellow, white, or flaming orange, 

 in bold bands and stripes, and the naked skin around the eye is usually 

 bright colored — ^blue-purple, peacock-blue, or green. Truly, toucans are 

 gorgeous birds! But it by no means follows that they are conspicuous in 

 their native woods! Not even though they are vociferous and active, and 

 often alight on exposed tree-top perches. Here or lower down in the forest, 

 their gaudy 'ruptive' patterns 'break them all to pieces,' and though the 

 predator at whose approach they 'freeze' into rigid stillness may espy the 

 black piece, or the red piece, or the yellow or the blue piece, he is still far 

 from sure to recognize his quarry, for none of these pieces has the form of a 

 bird. So with the colors of the tanagers, the birds of paradise, the macaws, 

 and all the rest of the brilliantly pied tropical forest birds, many of which 

 range, like the toucans, from the upper border of the forest underworld to 



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