194 
THE RUBY-THROATED HUMMING-BIRD. 
Humming-birds were kept, no appearance of a nest was to be seen, although 
the birds had frequently been observed caressing each other. Some have 
been occasionally kept confined in our Middle Districts, but I have not 
ascertained that any one survived a winter. 
The Humming-bird does not shun mankind so much as birds generally do. 
It frequently approaches flowers in the windows, or even in rooms when the 
windows are kept open, during the extreme heat of the day, and retufns, 
when not interrupted, as long as the flowers are unfaded. They are 
extremely abundant in Louisiana during spring and summer, and wherever 
a fine plant of the trumpet-flower is met with in the woods, one or more 
Humming-birds are generally seen about it, and now and then so many as 
ten or twelve at a time. They are quarrelsome, and have frequent battles 
in the air, especially the male birds. Should one be feeding on a flower, 
and another approach it, they are both immediately seen to rise in the air, 
twittering and twirling in a spiral manner until out of sight. The conflict 
over, the victor immediately returns to the flower. 
If comparison might enable you, kind reader, to form some tolerably 
accurate idea of their peculiar mode of flight, and their appearance when 
on wing, I would say, that were both objects of the same colour, a large 
sphinx or moth, when moving from one flower to another, and in a direct 
line, comes nearer the Humming-bird in aspect than any other object with 
which I am acquainted. 
Having heard several persons remark that these little creatures had been 
procured, with less injury to their plumage, by shooting them with water, I 
was tempted to make the experiment, having been in the habit of killing 
them either with remarkably small shot, or with sand. However, finding 
that even when within a few paces, I seldom brought one to the ground 
when I used water instead of shot, and was moreover obliged to clean my 
gun after every discharge, I abandoned the scheme, and feel confident that 
it can never have been used with material advantage. I have frequently 
secured some by employing an insect-net, and were this machine used with 
dexterity, it would afford the best means of procuring Humming-birds. 
I have represented several of these pretty and most interesting birds, in 
various positions, feeding, caressing each other, or sitting on the slender 
stalks of the trumpet-flower and pluming themselves. The diversity of 
action and attitude thus exhibited, may, I trust, prove sufficient to present a 
faithful idea of their appearance and manners. A figure of the nest you will 
also find has been given ; it is generally placed low, on the horizontal branch 
of any kind of tree, seldom more than twenty feet from the ground. They 
are far from being particular in this matter, as I have often found a nest 
attached by one side only to a twig of a rose-bush, currant, or the strong 
