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Birds of starry plumage flitted through the air, as they leaped from tree to tree, uttering a short, wild note; through the spreading branches sighed the murmuring breeze that came from off the ocean; round the shore the low tones of the gently-washing surf were borne as it came in in faint undulations from the outer sea. Underneath the deepest shadow of the palms lay Brandon.
Birds of brilliant plumage darted among the foliage, and squirrels chattered on the boughs. He saw bear tracks again, and called the sergeant's attention to them. "It would be nice to be hunting them, instead of men," said Whitley. "You can find nice, black fellows down here, good to eat, and it's a deal safer to hunt them than it is the grizzlies and silver-tips of the Rockies."
Blackbirds were very abundant, and they played a prominent part in the chorus which we heard throughout the day on every hand, though perhaps loudest the following morning at dawn. In its habits and manners the blackbird strikingly resembles our American robin, and indeed looks exactly like a robin, with a yellow bill and coal-black plumage.
Moreover, these little illuminated patches were alive with huge superbly-coloured butterflies, birds of gaudy plumage, and other winged creatures, whose forms were as novel as the combinations of colours which marked their bodies.
And the reflection merely of this hoped-for pleasure so brightened up the little bird that he looked positively lovely! Not even a bird of paradise could have appeared more glorious, dingy brown though our tiny hero's plumage was; but good deeds and kind words always bring a brightness with them.
Perhaps the worst pain he had to bear was a sort of weight on his chest, which made it very hard for him to breathe. So he commanded his servants to leave the windows open in order that he might get more air. One day, when he had been left alone for a few minutes, a bird with brilliant plumage came and fluttered round the window, and finally rested on the sill.
In passing through a gallery we may stop before a picture to be struck, almost startled, by the exact copy which it presents of some scene in nature; how like the clouds in the sky, the leaves on the trees, the very plumage of the birds!
The upper plumage of the hen is olive brown save for a brilliant blue patch on either side of the head. Her tail is chestnut red. This beautiful species is about the size of a sparrow. The hen, and the cock, when he is quite young, look rather like specimens of the bulbul family, being rich chestnut-hued birds with the head and crest metallic bluish black.
Hence it may be suspected that excess of food has first given redundancy to the plumage, and then that the law of homologous variation has led to the development of feathers on the legs, in a position corresponding with those on the wing, namely, on the outside of the tarsi and toes.
This bird is singularly grotesque in his appearance, though not without beauty of plumage.
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