THE RUBY-THROATED HUMMING-BIRD. 
191 
meets with pleasure and with food. Its gorgeous throat in beauty and 
brilliancy baffles all competition. Now it glows with a fiery hue, and again 
it is changed to the deepest velvety black. The upper parts of its delicate 
body are of resplendent changing green ; and it throws itself through the air 
with a swiftness and vivacity hardly conceivable. It moves from one flower 
to another like a gleam of light, upwards, downwards, to the right, and to 
the left. In this manner, it searches the extreme northern portions of our 
country, following with great precaution the advances of the season, and 
retreats with equal care at the approach of autumn. 
I wish it were in my power at this moment to impart to you, kind reader, 
the pleasures which I have felt whilst watching the movements, and viewing 
the manifestation of feelings displayed by a single pair of these most 
favourite little creatures, when engaged in the demonstration of their love 
to each other : — how the male swells his plumage and throat, and dancing on 
the wing, whirls around the delicate female ; how quickly he dives towards 
a flower, and returns with a loaded bill, which he offers to her to whom 
alone he feels desirous of being united ; how full of ecstacy he seems to be 
when his caresses are kindly received ; how his little wings fan her, as they 
fan the flowers, and he transfers to her bill the insect and the honey which he 
has procured with a view to please her ; how these attentions are received 
with apparent satisfaction ; how, soon after, the blissful compact is sealed ; 
how, then, the courage and care of the male are redoubled ; how he even 
dares to give chase to the Tyrant Fly-catcher, hurries the Blue-bird and the 
Martin to their boxes ; and how, on sounding pinions, he joyously returns to 
the side of his lovely mate. Reader, all these proofs of the sincerity, 
fidelity, and courage, with which the male assures his mate of the care he 
will take of her while sitting on her nest, may be seen, and have been seen, 
but cannot be portrayed or described. 
Could you, kind reader, cast a momentary glance on the nest of the 
Humming-bird, and see, as I have seen, the newly-hatched pair of young, 
little larger than humble-bees, naked, blind, and so feeble as scarcely to be 
able to raise their little bill to receive food from the parents ; and could you 
see those parents, full of anxiety and fear, passing and repassing within a few 
inches of your face, alighting on a twig not more than a yard from your 
body, waiting the result of your unwelcome visit in a state of the utmost 
despair, — you could not fail to be impressed with the deepest pangs which 
parental affection feels on the unexpected death of a cherished child. Then 
how pleasing is it, on your leaving the spot, to see the returning hope of the 
parents, when, after examining the nest, they find their nurslings untouched ! 
You might then judge how pleasing it is to a mother of another kind, to hear 
the physician who has attended her sick child assure her that the crisis is 
