Mimetic Analogy. 309 



curassows. There were five of thera; and they certainly did 

 look like curassows in flight and general appearance. The 

 plantain patch was thickly overgrown with- long grass and 

 weeds; but on I went, regardless of probable snakes and 

 certain swarms of agarrapatas, although I had been particularly 

 careful all day not to go where I was likely to carry any off. 

 As for the trogon I threw it away in contempt, having much 

 finer game in view. The curassows I thought would amply 

 repay me for a sleepless night, endless scratching and conse- 

 quent sores; so I stalked up to them and shot one, while the 

 others flew off to a not very distant tree. From their flight, 

 cries, and general appearance, I still thought they were cu- 

 rassows. The bird I killed fell into a dense thicket across a 

 stream. Could I only have got it, I should have been spared 

 additional agarrapatas and disappointment. However, not 

 stopping to pick up the dead one, I followed the others across 

 the plantain patch, then forced my way through an aloe fence, 

 which presented a perfect chevaux defrise of spikes, and suc- 

 ceeded in shooting three out of the remaining four. I now 

 felt proud of what I had done, and how well I had provided 

 for our pot, which was in great want of supplies at the time. 

 Edwards, who had been waiting for me, went to pick the birds 

 up. As he took hold of the first, he said ' this is a hawk/ and 

 hawks they all were, sure enough, to my great disgust and dis- 

 appointment. When dead they still much resembled curas- 

 sows, but were hawks nevertheless — nothing but great black, 

 striking, red-legged hawks. However, I was not disappointed 

 in agarrapatas, for I went home well stocked with them, and 

 in no pleasant humour at having little or nothing to repay me 

 for the discomfort I had to undergo.'" 



It may perhaps be asserted that these imitations are rather 

 general, and, as it were, accidental, than particular and de- 

 signed; I will, therefore, quote from the Transactions of the 

 Zoological Society, a much closer and more remarkable exam- 

 ple of mimicry, described by Mr. Wallace, who, when speak- 

 ing of the birds newly discovered by himself in the Mollucca 

 Islands, observes, "that two species of the Oriolidas, natives 

 of Bouru and Ceram, departed altogether from the natural ap- 

 pearance of the group, and mimicked two species of Honey- 

 suckers so closely as to deceive ordinary observers.'''' Speak- 

 ing of the birds inhabiting Bouru, he writes, " the oriole has 

 departed from the usual gay colouring of its allies, and is actu- 

 ally the dullest coloured of its family, while the honeysucker 

 that it imitates very much resembles in its colouration other 

 species of the group to which it belongs. The imitation is car- 

 ried to the minutest particulars ; the black orbits of the honey- 

 sucker are copied by a patch of dusky feathers around the 



