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half from the beak, continuing the same curve as that of the beak. When she arose, it was to perform a very interesting action; for she flew to the face of the rock-which was thickly clothed with soft dry moss, and, hovering on the wing, as if before a flower, began to pluck the moss, until she had a large bunch of it in her beak. Then I saw her fly to the nest, and, having seated herself in it, proceed to place the new material, pressing, and arranging, and interweaving the whole with her beak, while she fashioned the cup-like form of the interior by the pressure of her white breast, moving round and round as she sat. My presence appeared to be no hindrance to her proceedings, though only a few feet distant. At length she left again, and I left the place also. On the 8th of April, I visited the cave again, and found the nest perfected, and containing two eggs, which were not hatched on the 1st of May, on which day I sent Sam to endeavor to secure both dam and nest. He found her sitting, and had no difficulty in capturing her, which, with the nest and its contents, he carefully brought down to me. I transferred it having broken one egg by accident-to a cage, and put in the bird. She was mopish, however, and quite neglected the nest, as she did also some flowers which I inserted. The next morning she was dead."

When looking at humming-birds-some not bigger than an humble bee, and blazing with all the refulgence of the brightest jewels-it is scarcely possible to imagine how they can be obtained without serious damage to their beauty. Some writers have stated that they are shot with charges of sand; others, that water is the missile-but they are mistaken; various methods are certainly employed, but neither of those. The little creatures are sometimes shot with small charges of “ dust-shot,” as the smallest pellets are called; frequently the keen eye and steady hand of the Indians bring them down by an arrow from their blow-tube; a third mode is to watch them into a deep tubular flower, and to secure them with a gauze net, which is skilfully thrown over it. Very many humming-birds were caught by Mr. Gosse, with a common gauze butterfly net, on a ring a foot in diameter. The curiosity of humming-birds is great; and on holding up the net near one, he frequently

would not fly away, but come and hover over the mouth, stretching out his little neck to peep in. Often, too, when an unsuccessful stroke was made, the bird would return immediately, and suspend itself in the air, just over his pursuer's head, or peep into his face with unconquerable familiarity. But, when caught, they usually soon died; they would suddenly fall to the floor of the cage, and lie motionless, with closed eyes. If taken into the hand, they would perhaps seem to revive for a few moments, then throw back the pretty head, or toss it to and fro as if in great suffering, expand the wings, open the eyes, slightly puff the feathers of the breast, and die. Such was the result of his first efforts to procure these birds alive; but he was subsequently more fortunate.

Collecting the nests of humming-birds in the West Indies requires some care, on account of the great number of venomous serpents which frequent the thickets.

While Alexander Wilson, the subsequently celebrated ornithologist, was struggling against poverty in his early days as a weaver, he was much importuned by a shopmate to write him an epitaph. This individual had excelled in little, except, to use the expressive Scottish word, daundering about the hedge-rows on Sundays, in search of birds' nests. After much pressing, Wilson complied, and hit off the following:

Below this stane John Allan rests
An honest soul, though plain;
He sought hail Sabbath days for nests,
But always sought in vain.

Had Mr. Allan pursued his nidal investigations in Jamaica his curiosity might have met with an unpleasant check. A young gentleman of similar tastes, observing a parroquet enter a hole in a large duckant's nest situated on a bastard cedar, mounted to take her eggs or young. Arrived at the place, he cautiously inserted his hand, which presently came into contact with something smooth and soft; he thought it might be the callow young, but having some misgivings, descended and procured a stick; having again mounted, he thrust in the stick, and forced off the whole upper part of the structure, when, to his utter discomfiture and terror, an enormous yellow boa was disclosed, his jaws retaining the feathers of

A story is told of a trick played upon an enthusiastic foreign naturalist, on his landing at Rio Janeiro, by certain middies of the ship which had carried him out. The worthy savant was very stout, very near-sighted, and very eager to collect humming-birds. The young gentlemen, therefore, determined to make merry at his expense in the following manner :-Having caught several large blue-bottle flies, they stuck them over with small bits of gay peacock feathers, with two long plumules behind, by way of tail; the wings were left free. Then carefully placing the chairs, boxes, and crockery of the doctor's apartment in every possible direction, they turned their insect "daws" loose into the room, and quietly waited the result in the adjoining chamber. Presently the victim was heard creaking slowly up the stairs anathematizing the heat and puffing for breath. He entered his room, the door closed, and there was a pause. Very shortly a tremendous scuffling and rushing about commenced; chairs were heard to fall, crockery to break, and at last the smash of a looking-glass completed the scene. The wags now entered the room, and found the doctor with his coat off in a state of great excitement; his eyes were filled with tears, and he was actively rubbing one of his shins. "Good gracious! my dear sir, what's the matter? Is it a coup de soleil, or-the brandy, eh?" "No sare; neither the one nor de other," replied he, with intense earnestness; "I was catch de charmant littel bottel-blue homing bairds, but dey be so dam wild." His indignation, when the explosion of now irrepressible laughter proclaimed the trick, was marvellous to behold.

the parroquet, which had just been swal- | was brought to Wilson himself. One of lowed. The serpent instantly darted down them flew out of the window the same eventhe tree, and the curious youth descended ing, and, falling against a wall, was killed; scarcely less rapidly, and fled, cured for a the other refused food, and the next morntime of bird-nesting. ing was all but dead; a lady undertook to be the nurse of this lonely one, placed it in her bosom, and as it began to revive, dissolved a little sugar in her mouth, into which she thrust its bill, and it sucked with great avidity; in this manner it was brought up until fit for the cage. Mr. Wilson kept it upwards of three months, supplied it with loaf sugar dissolved in water, which it preferred to honey and water, and gave it fresh flowers every morning, sprinkled with the liquid. It appeared gay, active, and full of spirit, hovering from flower to flower, as if in its native wilds; and always expressed, by its motions and chirping, great pleasure at seeing fresh flowers introduced to its cage; every precaution was supposed to have been taken to prevent its getting at large, and to preserve it through the winter; but unfortunately it by some means got out of its cage, and, flying about the room, so injured itself that it soon died. A striking instance is mentioned by the same author, of the susceptibility of some humming birds to cold; in 1809, a very beautiful male was brought to him, put into a wire cage, and placed in a shady part of the room, the weather being unusually cold; after fluttering about some time, it clung by the wires, and hung in a seemingly torpid state for a whole forenoon; no motion of respiration could be perceived, though at other times this is remarkably perceptible; the eyes were shut, and when touched by the fingers it gave no signs of life or motion; it was carried into the open air, and placed directly in the rays of the sun, in a sheltered situation. In a few seconds respiration became apparent; the bird breathed faster and faster, opened its eyes, and began to look about with as much vivacity as ever. After it had completely recovered, it was restored to liberty and flew off to the withered top of a pear-tree, where it sat for some time dressing its disordered plumage, and then shot off like a meteor.

Wilson, in his " American Ornithology," states, that Mr. C. W. Peale told him that he had two young humming-birds, which he had raised from the nest. They used to fly about the room, and would frequently perch on Mrs. Peale's shoulder to be fed. When the sun shone strongly in the chamber, they have been seen darting after the motes that floated in the light, as fly-catchers would after flies. In the summer of 1803, a nest of young humming-birds, nearly ready to fly,

The flight of the humming-bird from flower to flower has been described as resembling that of the bee, but so much more rapid, that the latter appears a loiterer by comparison The bird poises himself on

wing while he thrusts his long slender tubu- | perceiving the strange object to be still unlar tongue into the flowers in search of honey or of insects; he will dart into a room through an open window, examine a bouquet of flowers with the eye of a connoisseur, and, presto! is gone. One of these birds has been known to take refuge in a hot-house during the cold autumnal nights, leaving it in the morning, and returning regularly every evening to its chosen twig in its warm palace.

For though he hath countless airy homes
To which his wings excursive roves;
Yet still from time to time he loves
To light upon earth, and find such cheer
As brightens his banquet here.

The Mango Humming-Bird is familiarly known to the negroes of Jamaica by the name of the "Doctor Bird," said to have been thus derived. In the olden time when costume was more observed than now, the black livery of this bird among its more brilliant companions, bore the same relation as the sombre costume of the grave physician to the gay colors then worn by the wealthy planters, whence the humorous comparison and name. It might, with equal propriety, have been called the Parson, but in those days ecclesiastics were but little known by the negroes.

Mr. Gosse observed that the bunch of blossom at the summit of the pole-like papaw tree is a favorite resort of this species, and, taking advantage of this, succeeded in catching a fine live specimen. "Wishing," says he, "to keep these birds in captivity, I watched at the tree one evening with a gauze ring-net in my hand, with which I dashed at one, and though I missed my aim, the attempt so astonished it, that it appeared to have lost its presence of mind, so to speak, flitting hurriedly hither and thither for several seconds before it flew away. The next evening, however, I was more successful. I took my station and remained quite still, the net being held up close to an inviting bunch of blossom; the humming birds came near in their course around the tree, sipped the surrounding blossoms, eyeing the net; hung in the air for a moment in front of the fatal cluster without touching it, and then, arrow-like, darted away. At length one, after surveying the net, passed again round the tree; on approaching it the second time,

moved, he took courage and began to suck. I quite trembled with hope; in an instant the net was struck, and, before I could see any thing, the rustling of his confined wings within the gauze told that the little beauty was a captive. I brought him in triumph to the house and caged him, but he was very restless, clinging to the sides and wires and fluttering violently about. The next morning, having gone out on an excursion for a few hours, I found the poor bird on my return dying, having beaten himself to death.

Two young males, of the long-tailed species, were subsequently captured, and, instead of being caged, they were turned loose into a room. They were lively, but not wild; playful towards each other, and tame to their captor-sitting on his finger, unrestrained, for several seconds at a time; on a large bunch of Asclepias being brought into the room, they flew to the nosegay and sucked while in Mr. Gosse's hand; these and other flowers being placed in glasses, they visited each bouquet in turn, sometimes playfully chasing each other, and alighting on various objects. As they flew, they were repeatedly heard to snap the beak, at which time they doubtless caught minute flies; after some time, one of them suddenly sunk down in one corner, and on being taken up, seemed dying; it had perhaps struck itself during its flight; it lingered awhile and died.

Another of these long-tailed humming birds, brought alive to Mr. Gosse, became so familiar, that even before he had had the bird a day it flew to his face, and perching on his lip or chin, thrust his beak into his mouth. He grew so bold and so frequent in his visits as to become almost annoying, thrusting its protruded tongue into all parts of his mouth, in the most inquisitive manner; occasionally his master gratified him by taking a little syrup into his mouth, and inviting him to the banquet by a slight sound, which he soon learned to understand. Mr. Gosse had now several pets of this beautiful species, and it was interesting to observe how each selected his own place for perching and for roosting, to which he invariably adhered, a peculiarity which caused many others to be caught, for, by observing a place of resort, and putting a little bird

lime on that twig, a bird would be captured | caught humming-birds were confined, they in a few minutes. Of the birds in this would fly out, and soar to the ceiling, rarely gentleman's possession, one would occasion- seeking the window. There they would ally attack a gentler and more confiding remain on rapidly vibrating pinions, lightly companion, who always yielded and fled, touching the plaster with the beak or breast whereupon the little bully would perch and every second and slightly rebounding: after utter a cry of triumph in a succession of a time they became exhausted and sank shrill chirps. After a day or two, however, rapidly down to alight; they would then the persecuted one would pluck up courage, suffer themselves to be raised, applying their and play the tyrant in turn, interdicting his little feet to a finger passed under the fellow from sipping at the sweetened cup; breast; they were then gently raised to twenty times, in succession, would the thirsty their captor's mouth, and would generally bird drop down on the wing to the glass, suck syrup from the lips with eagerness. but no sooner was he poised and about to When once fed from the mouth the birds insert his tongue, than the other would dart were always ready to suck afterwards, and down, with inconceivable swiftness, and, frequently voluntarily sought the lips : after wheeling so as to come up beneath him, a time a glass of syrup was presented to it would drive him away from the repast; he instead of the lips, and it soon learned to might fly to any other part of the room un- sip from this, finding it as it stood on a molested, but an approach to the cup was a table; it was then considered domesticated. signal for an instant assault. When these birds had become accustomed to the room, their vivacity was extreme, and their quick turns caused their lovely breasts to flash out from darkness into sudden lustrous light, like rich gems. Their movements in the air were so rapid as to baffle the eye. Suddenly the radiant little meteor would be lost in one corner, and as quickly, the vibration of its invisible wings would be heard behind the spectator,--in another instant it would be hovering in front of his face, curiously peering into his eyes with his own bright little orbs.

Of twenty-five of this species taken, only seven were domesticated, and there was much difference in the tempers of these: some being moody and sulky, others wild and timid, and others gentle and confiding from the first.

It is just possible that these pages may be perused by some one under favorable circumstances for the capture of humming-birds. To them the following remarks founded on the experience of Mr. Gosse, may prove acceptable. There should be a very capacious cage, wired on every side, in the bottom of which a supply of decaying fruit, as oranges or pines, should be constantly kept, but covered with wire that the birds may not soil their plumage. This would attract immense numbers of small flies which would in conjunction with syrup afford food for the birds. It was observed that on opening the basket in which newly VOL. II.-36

Not the least curious part of the structure of humming-birds is the tongue, which consists of two tubes laid side by side like a double-barrelled gun, but separated at a short distance from the tip, where each is somewhat flattened. This tongue is connected with a very beautiful apparatus, whereby it can be darted out to a great length, and suddenly retracted. The food of humming-birds consists of insects, and the honeyed juices of flowers, and with this tongue the latter are pumped up. The mode of catching insects is interesting. I have (says Mr. Bullock)* frequently watched with much amusement the cautious peregrination of the humming-bird, who advancing beneath the web (of the spiders) entered the various labyrinths and cells in search of entangled flies, but as the larger spiders did not tamely surrender their booty, the invader was often compelled to retreat: being within a few feet I could observe all their evolutions with great precision. The active little bird generally passed once or twice round the court as if to reconnoitre his ground, and commenced his attack by going carefully under the nets of the wily insect, and seizing by surprise the smallest entangled insects, or those that were most feeble. In ascending the angular traps of the spider great care and skill was required; sometimes he had scarcely room for his little wings to perform their office, and the least deviation would

Six Months in Mexico.

have entangled him in the complex machi- | whose eave was within the reach of most

nery of the web, and involved him in ruin. It was only the works of the smaller spiders that he durst attack, as the largest rose to the defence of their citadels, when the besieger would shoot off like a sunbeam, and could only be traced by the luminous glows of his refulgent colors. The bird generally spent about ten minutes in this predatory excursion, and then alighted on a branch of an avocata to rest and refresh himself, placing his crimson star-like breast to the sun, when there presented all the glowing fire of the ruby, and surpassed in lustre the diadem of a monarch.

The mode in which the humming birds in Mr. Gosse's possession partook of their favorite banquet of syrup was very characteristic. These volatile geniuses would not condescend to such a matter of fact proceeding as to fly straight to the glass-by no means they invariably made a dozen or twenty distinct stages or swoops, each in a curve descending a little-then ascending again and hovering a second or two at each angle. Sometimes when they arrived opposite the cup more quickly than was intended they would retreat again, as if, as with hydropathic patients, a certain number of "turns" were indispensable before breakfast. When this proceeding was completed and the appetite had acquired the proper razor edge, they would bring their tiny feet to the edge of the glass, insert the sucking tongue in its contents and take a draught of nectar.

From "Tait's Magazine."

THE MAY-EVE'S YARRA.

A LEGEND OF ULSTER.

Ar the close of the last century, there stood in a low and pastoral dell, over which the shadow of Heinesnaught, the highest and central peak of the barony, lengthened with the declining day, two dwellings, one at each extremity of a lane which led up through farm-fields from a sort of bridleroad, the only highway then known in the district. That which stood nearest the road was a substantial farm-house in those days for Innishowen. It had thick walls, highpointed gables, and a heavily-thatched roof,

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men. There was a rough farm-yard behind, a potato-garden in front, with an open space between it and the door, which was seldom shut. While daylight lasted there was a continuous tumult there of children, pigs, or domestic labor; for it was the well-filled domicile of Connor Dempsey. Within that mansion Connor was believed to reign over a second wife, ten children, two strong-armed maids, and as many servant-men, not to speak of a shaggy but faithful house-dog, which some neighbors whispered was the single inhabitant that rendered him obediConnor was, besides, the nominal owner of what he termed a decent byre and barn, a large stock of sheep, cattle, pigs, and poultry, a farm of considerable size, with a long lease and a low rent, whose harvests liberally repaid his regular though simple cultivation.

ence.

Connor Dempsey was a substantial man among his people and well descended; for many a Dempsey had lived and died in the farm-house since his great-grandfather built in its rear the kiln, with an excavated stillhouse below, in which business had been carried on and improved by each successive generation. The premises at the top of the lane presented a striking contrast to those at its entrance. They consisted of a house scarce half the size, but its walls glistened with very whiteness; the roof was more neatly thatched, the door was absolutely painted, and a miniature gravel-walk led to it through a green, where primroses grew thick in the spring-time. There was a well in its centre, with the reputation of never growing dry in the warmest summer, shadowed by a great old thorn, which May made white with blossoms. The well-cleaned windows shone through the boughs of two tall sweetbriers, which almost covered the front; one of them giving a glimpse of muslin curtains-no trifling rarities in the scene of our story-and the other a still more shaded view of Miss Bridget Dempsey and her niece at their accustomed spinningwheels. Miss Bridget was Connor Dempsey's sister; she had been the only one among seven senior brothers, and might have been a belle of the first water in Innishowen, as to a more than ordinary share of beauty there was added in her case the attraction of an unusually large portion, and

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