V 



HUMMING-BIRDS. 139 



three thousand miles each spring and autumn. The 

 antarctic humming-bird visits the inhospitable shores of 

 Tierra-del-Fuego, where it has been seen visiting the 

 flowers of fuchsias in a snow-storm, while it spends the 

 winter in the warmer parts of Chili and Bolivia. 



In the south of California and in the Central United 

 States three or four other species are found in summer ; 

 but it is only when we enter the tropics that the number 

 of different kinds becomes considerable. In Mexico there 

 are more than thirty species, while in the southern parts 

 of Central America there are more than double that 

 number. As we go on towards the equator they become 

 still more numerous, till they reach their maximum in 

 the equatorial Andes. They especially abound in the 

 mountainous regions ; while the luxuriant forest plains 

 of the Amazons, in which so many other forms of life 

 reach their maximum, are very poor in humming-birds. 

 Brazil, being more hilly and with more variety of vege- 

 tation, is richer, but does not equal the Andean valleys, 

 plateaux, and volcanic peaks. Each separate district of 

 the Andes has its peculiar species and often its peculiar 

 genera, and many of the great volcanic mountains 

 possess kinds which are confined to them. Thus, on the 

 great mountain of Pichincha there is a peculiar species 

 found at an elevation of about fourteen thousand feet 

 only ; while an allied species on Chimborazo ranges 

 from fourteen thousand feet to the limits of perpetual 

 snow at sixteen thousand feet elevation. It frequents a 

 beautiful yellow-flowered alpine shrub belonging to the 

 Asteracese. On the extinct volcano of Chiriqui in 

 Veragua a minute humming-bird, called the little Flame- 

 bearer, has been only found inside the crater. Its scaled 



