IF these exquisite little creatures are called Humming-birds, you little folk may ask, why wasn't the Bee called a Buzzard because it buzzes?
Well, really, that is a question which I will not attempt to answer, but the fact remains that no other name would have been so appropriate for these jewel-like birds but the one above, on account of the humming sound which they produce when hovering in their curious fashion over a tempting blossom, and feeding on its contents while suspended in air.
There are four hundred and sixty-seven species of these little birds, and no two of them, 'tis said, make precisely the same sound, one producing a noise exactly like the whizzing of a wheel driven by machinery, while that of another is very like the droning hum of a large Bee. But no two voices in even one human family, you know, are alike, so it is not amazing that the rule holds good among the birds.
You can capture and tame these lovely little creatures, too, though I wouldn't advise you to keep them in a cage very long. They will pine away and look very doleful if you do. Rather, after you have accustomed them to your presence, and fed them regularly upon the honey and syrup and other sweets which they dearly love, open the cage door and give them their liberty. A gentleman once did this and was delighted to see them return to their old quarters in a very little while. By watching them the next morning after setting them free again, he found they had been pining for a nice fresh garden Spider which they had been accustomed to daintily pick from the center of his web. He had provided them with Spiders and Flies, but they wanted to flit about and search for themselves. For dessert they liked the sweets which he gave them, so back they went to their cage, instead of extracting it from the flowers with their long bills, as they were wont to do.
A Humming-bird one summer built its nest in a butternut tree very near a lady's window. She could look right down into its nest, and one day, as it began to rain, she saw the mother-bird take one or two large leaves from a tree near by and cover her little birdlings with it. She understood how to make an umbrella, didn't she?
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| From col. Chi. Acad. Sciences. | HUMMING-BIRDS. Life-size. | Copyright by Nature Study Pub. Co., 1898, Chicago. |
"Minutest of the feathered kind,