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Mrs. Wharton-Tigar —



AN AMATEUR’S EXPERIENCE IN IMPORTING

HUMMING BIRDS


By Mrs. Wharton-Tigar


In September last year I accompanied my husband on a short

visit to Pernambuco, Brazil. This place is practically unexplored

from an avicultural point of view, so I determined to try and bring

home a collection of rare birds. With this end in view, I made

a hurried study of the birds to be found in that part of Brazil,

and in this I was greatly helped by an article by a Mr. Forbes,

written in The Ibis in 1881 , on the birds he saw in Pernambuco

when on a visit there.


Late in July I had met Mr. Seth-Smith and he had accepted my

offer to obtain and bring over twenty Humming Birds for the Zoo.

As I was returning in November and my stay in Pernambuco would

only last three weeks, I rather wondered if I had been rash in

making this offer !


We chose the Royal Holland Lloyd line to travel on, as it was

the only line we could find that would let us bring back birds and

would undertake to keep them warm. We sailed from Southampton

on the S.S. Zeelandia on 28 th September, and early dawn of 12 th

October saw us nearing Pernambuco. As we slowed down to await

the pilot boat the air was delicious, clear and not too warm; the

port showing itself in a very long line of twinkling lights. After

some hours we slowly got alongside the quay, and as we got in we

could see natives—niggers and mulattos—with pineapples, highly

painted gourds, and many large cages of birds, squirrel monkeys,

marmosets, and other small mammals, which they try to sell to the

passengers, mostly, of course, on the home-coming boats. I noticed

that the birds offered were not in good condition, usually sticky,

the Manakins and Hummers especially.


The State is generally known by the name of Pernambuco, but

the town there is really called 11 Recife It is divided into three

parts by the River Capiberibe, which winds in and out, separating

the portions known as Recife, Santo Antonio, and Boa Vista.

Bridges across give the place a gay appearance and in various parts



