All about this beautiful little birds were flitting, and as we watched them for some time I could see their feathers flash and glitter in the sunshine, as if some wore tiny helmets of burnished gold and breastplates of purple glittering scales. No colours could paint the beauty of these lovely little creatures, which seemed to be of several different kinds, for some had patches of scarlet, of orange, blue, and white to add to the brilliancy of their feathering; and so little used were they to the sight of man that they seemed to pay no attention to us, but allowed us to go very close, so that we could see them flit and hover and balance themselves before the sweet-scented starry bell-flowers, into whose depths they thrust their long thin beaks after the honey and insects that made them their home.
I soon learned from my uncle that they were the sun-birds, the tiny little fellows that were in the Old World what the humming-birds were in the New, for there are no humming-birds in the East.
Following Uncle Dick’s example, I took the shot out of my gun, for he said that the concussion and the wad would be sufficient to bring them down. But, somehow, we were so interested in what we saw that neither of us thought of firing, and there we stood watching the glittering feathers, the graceful motions, and the rapidity with which these tiny birds seemed to flash from blossom to blossom, till a loud yell from Ebo summoned us to breakfast.
“Yes, Nat,” said my uncle, who seemed to read my thoughts, “that is the way to see the beauty of the sun-birds. No stuffed specimens of ours will ever reproduce a hundredth part of their beauty; but people cannot always come from England to see these things. Take care! What’s that?”
We were going through rather a dense patch of undergrowth, where the ground beneath was very soft and full of water, evidently from some boggy springs. There was a great deal of cane and tall grass, with water weeds of a most luxuriant growth, and the place felt hot and steamy as we forced our way through, till, as I was going first and parting the waving canes right and left with my gun barrel, I stepped upon what seemed to be a big branch of a rotten tree that had fallen there, when suddenly I felt myself lifted up a few inches and jerked back, while at the same moment the canes and grass crashed and swayed, and something seemed to be in violent motion.
“Is it an earthquake, uncle?” I said, looking aghast at the spot from whence had been jerked.
“Yes, Nat, and there it goes. Fire, boy, fire!”
He took rapid aim a little to the left, where the canes and broad-leaved plants were swaying to and fro in a curious way, just as if, it seemed then, a little pig was rushing through, and following his example I fired in the same direction.
But our shots seemed to have no effect, and whatever it was dashed off into a thicker part, where it was too swampy to follow even if we had been so disposed.
“Your earthquake has got away for the present, Nat,” said my uncle. “Did you see it?”