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Updated: June 15, 2025
I know nothing, however, more attractive to a man who loves nature than to lie down beneath some great plant of convolvulus, or any trumpet-shaped blossom, and watch the humming-birds flashing to and fro in the sunlight. Their scale-like feathers on throat and head reflect the sun rays like so many gems, and their colours are the most gorgeous that it is possible to conceive.
In the humming-birds, we see the same perfect adaptation of their construction to their peculiar wants which is found throughout the whole animal creation. This is beautifully exhibited in the sickle-bill, which is occasionally found in Bogota. Its bill is very short and sharply curved, in order that it may enter the short, curved flowers of that region.
Humming-birds and bumble-bees in the blossoming-time make a dreamy booming among the shadowy sprays.
"If we could only be at peace again!" I thought; and I lay wakeful, still thinking of the garden, the growing fruit, the humming-birds that whirred about like great insects among the flowers, and emitted a bright flash every now and then as the sun glanced from their scale-like feathers.
A pair of humming-birds darted into the stillness in a little tempest of shrill-voiced contention, and the mule, aroused from dejected abstraction by the intruders, shook his tassel-like tail and yawned humanly.
They must all be mounted the insects quivering upon brass wire, the humming-birds with their feathers ruffled; they must be cleansed and polished, the beak in a bright red, claw repaired with a silk thread, dead eyes replaced with sparkling pearls, and the insect or the bird restored to an appearance of life and grace.
Our scanty supply of powder made us refrain from shooting any of the numberless birds we saw fluttering amid the trees or skimming along the surface of the water. Among them were several species of beautiful humming-birds, which, as they darted here and there, glittered like gems in the air.
I heard one wild shriek rise from the flower fairies, as they fell each from the lily cup, no longer of full human size, but withered, shrivelled, diminished a thousand-fold, and lay on the bare sand, like little rosy humming-birds' eggs, all crushed and dead. The great blue heaven above me spoke, and cried, "Selfish and sense-bound! thou hast murdered beauty!"
It was that one we have been speaking of. It was seated upon a tree, not far from the honeysuckles; but every now and then it would spring from its perch, dash forward, and after whirring about for some moments among the humming-birds fly back to the same tree. At first the boys watched these manoeuvres without having their curiosity excited. It was no new thing to see birds acting in this manner.
But I felt as if I must stop again and again to let the boat drift, and watch humming-birds, or brightly-painted butterflies and beetles, flitting here and there, so that it was quite a couple of hours before we reached the spot, and suddenly turned the curve of the river into the eddy.
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