318



S. Porter—Wanderings in the Far East



Sometimes the whole garden seemed to be filled with those radiant

little gems, Van Hasselt’s Sunbird (Leptocoma brasiliana), but their

visits were very spasmodic. They appear to arrive in small parties

until after a time there seems to be a hundred of them, and their sharp

metallic notes can be heard from every flowering tree and shrub. In

fact, this seemed to be one of the few species of Sunbird which shows

any tendency to flock ; I suppose this is due to its pacific disposition.

In captivity many of these birds can be kept together and they show

little or no inclination to fight, a rare thing with Sunbirds. Had I not

known what the birds were I would have sworn that they were Humming

Birds, for they hovered around the flowers looking quite black in the

distance, as Humming Birds usually do. Sometimes a male would alight

on a slender twig, lift up his head, and show his blazing amethyst

gorget, very much in the manner of a Humming Bird. Then, again, I

sometimes mistook them for the Giant Blue-black Bees which haunted

the garden and bored holes in the woodwork of the bungalow. When in

a wild state or freshly caught there are few birds which can equal this

one for sheer beauty, in fact one is left with a sense of amazement that

a bird could be so beautiful. No artist could paint or no writer draw

a pen picture which could adequately portray this living gem. Few

Humming Birds can equal it, either in the radiance of its colouring or

in the elegance of its form. It is certainly one of the loveliest of the

Sunbird family, which is saying a good deal.


Unfortunately I know of no bird whose iridescent plumage so

quickly fades in captivity as this one, and in a short time it is soon

but a faded semblance of the radiant gem which hovered around the

scarlet hibiscus in that far away sunlit garden near the sea in Malaya.

I will try and describe its colouring, but my description must fall short

of giving anything like a true picture of this exquisite little atom of

feathered life. The whole head and nape are a scintillating Humming

Bird green, which in the wild bird glows like a green light. The upper

back, neck, cheeks, and wings intense velvety black ; the lower back

and tail coverts, which are long and each feather distinct, are a

scintillating steel blue, which is also the colour of the lesser wing-coverts

which, when the wings are expanded, form a crescent across the back.

The tail is deep shining purple blue. The throat and upper breast can



