444 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



FIELD NOTES ON SOME WEST INDIAN BIRDS. 

 By Peecy Kendall, M.D., F.Z.S. 



The Indian name for Trinidad is " Iere," of which the trans- 

 lation is " The Land of the Humming Bird"; and amongst the 

 birds I collected the Trochilidce were one of the chief features. 

 Special interest attached to these collections, since little accurate 

 knowledge was available, owing to the fact that the skins exported 

 had been procured in consequence of the hateful demands created 

 by French plumassiers, &c. Though labelled indiscriminately 

 " Trinidad," many of them had been collected on the mainland 

 of Venezuela. Wise legislation in the West Indies has placed 

 some check upon the slaughter of the Hummers, though it has 

 not been entirely stamped out. 



There is an old collection of birds in the Victoria Institute 

 which comprises 356 separate species, made by the late Dr. 

 Leotaud, and it includes fourteen different kinds of Humming 

 Birds. The following birds I obtained : — 



Lampornis violicauda, Bodd. "The Mango-hummer." — As 

 with most other members of this family at the time of year I 

 collected, the chief resort of this species was the " bois immortel" 

 tree, which was then in flower. Two varieties of this tree have 

 been imported, and it is extensively used as " shade" for young 

 cocoa and nutmeg plantations. Though the flowers are different 

 in shade and size, they are apparently both very melliferous, being 

 equally patronized by these birds. There is a popular belief, as 

 ill-grounded as most others, that Humming-birds never perch; 

 this seems almost superfluous to contradict, but let me say that 

 it is their constant practice (though they feed on the wing only, 

 and may visit several trees for that purpose) to resort to a favourite 

 perching-twig to rest in the intervals. 



Chrysolampis mosquitus, Linn. " Ruby Topaz." — The com- 

 monest species in both Trinidad and Tobago ; the specimens I 

 collected cleared up a doubtful point bearing on the plumage of 



