HUMMING BIRD. 
177 
notes, and plainness of plumage. Though this interesting 
and beautiful genus of birds comprehends upwards of seventy 
species, all of which, with a very few exceptions, are natives 
of America and its adjacent islands, it is yet singular, that the 
species now before us should be the only one of its tribe that 
ever visits the territory of the United States. 
According to the observations of my friend Mr Abbot, of 
Savannah, in Georgia, who has been engaged these thirty 
years in collecting and drawing subjects of natural history in 
that part of the country, the Humming Bird makes its first 
appearance there, from the south, about the 23d of March ; 
two weeks earlier than it does in the county of Burke, sixty 
miles higher up the country towards the interior ; and at 
and it is with wonder that we see creatures of such tiny dimensions occa- 
sionally daring to brave even the snows and frosts of a northern latitude. 
The present species, though sometimes exceeding its appointed time, is obliged 
to seek warmer abodes during winter ; and it is another subject for astonish- 
ment and reflection, how they are enabled to perform a lengthened migration, 
where the slightest gale would waft them far from their proper course. Mr 
Audubon is of opinion, that they migrate during the night, passing through 
the air in long undulations, raising themselves for some distance at an angle 
of about 40°, and then falling in a curve ; but he adds, that the smallness of 
their size precludes the possibility of following them farther than fifty or sixty 
yards, even with a good glass. 
The Humming Birds, or what are generally known by the genus Trochilus 
of Linnaeus, have been, through the researches of late travellers and naturalists, 
vastly increased in their numbers ; they form a large and closely connected 
group, but shew a considerable variety of form and character, and have been 
divided into different genera. They may be said to be strictly confined to 
the New World, with her islands ; and although other countries possess many 
splendid and closely allied forms, “ with gemmed frontlets and necks of verdant 
gold,” which have been by some included, none we consider can properly range 
with any of those found in this division of the world. In India and the Asiatic 
continent, they may be represented by Ccereba, &c. ; in Africa, by Nectarinia 
and Cyniris ; and in Australia and in the Southern Pacific, by Meliphaga, 
Myrzomela, &c. Europe possesses no direct prototype. 
The second northern species alluded to was discovered by Captain Cook in 
Nootka Sound, and first described by Dr Latham, as the Ruffed-necked 
Humming Bird. Mr Swainson introduces it in the Northern Zoology, under 
his genus Selasphorus. It ranges southwards to Real del Monte, on the table- 
land of Mexico. — Ed. 
VOL. I. 
M 
