HUMMING-BIRDS. 
29 
inhabit the gloomy forests, feeding chiefly on insects, instead of courting the sun¬ 
shine and sucking the honey from flowers. Mr. Stolzmann states that in Peru the 
grey-throated hermit (P. griseigularis), instead of inhabiting the hot and moist 
forests, like the other species of the genus, frequents dry and arid valleys, where 
it seeks the densest thickets and sometimes banana-plantations. While this observer 
was passing near some thick bushes, he was once arrested by the sound of a very 
shrill note, repeated at intervals, which struck him at first as the utterance of a 
tanager, and he searched in vain 
to find the bird. Baffled, he at 
last lay down at the bottom of 
the thicket, and after some 
minutes discovered a tiny bird 
perched on a branch quite close 
to the ground. Here was the 
meeting-place of the hermits, 
and the observer at length found 
four or five of these birds seated 
at a short distance from each 
other, at intervals uttering their 
whistle, while sometimes one 
would take a short flight round, 
and then hasten back to the 
same place. Subsequently he 
heard the birds on several 
occasions in the same thicket, 
uttering their characteristic cry. At another place exactly the same curious 
habits were observed in an allied species (P. superciliosus). Mr. Stolzmann also 
says that the hermits often come in front of an intruder, and remain suspended 
in the air, examining him all the time with marked curiosity. 
The sword-Biii In the single species of the genus Docimastes we meet with the 
Humming-Bird. mos t extreme development of bill among the humming-birds, since it 
is here equal to the length of the whole bird, measuring, at least, as much as 
4 inches. The home of this bird is in the Andes, from Venezuela and Colombia to 
Peru; and the long bill is specially developed to enable its owner to extract insects 
from elongated tubular flowers. In some parts of Peru, visited by the Polish 
travellers, Jelski and Stolzmann, the sword-bill was by no means common, although 
tubular flowers were met with in abundance, and the bird need fear no rivals, since 
no others of its kindred could probe these long tubes. Jelski states that he found 
the species frequenting a Jacksonia with a long red corolla; the bird hovering for 
a moment before the flower, inserting its beak rapidly, and then withdrawing two 
or three inches, when it again shot the bill into the same flower; this manoeuvre 
being repeated many times on the same blossom. The bird is also said sometimes 
to pierce the side of the flower with its lance-like bill to get at the honey within. 
According to Mr. Salvin, the female has a longer bill than the male, this organ 
reaching a length of 7 inches in the hen bird, whose colours are a little less 
brilliant than those of her mate. 
PEETEE S HERMIT. 
