FIELD NOTES ON SOME WEST INDIAN BIRDS.
By Percy Rendall, M.D., F.Z.S.
The Indian name for Trinidad is "Iëre," of which the translation is "The Land of the Humming Bird"; and amongst the birds I collected the Trochilidæ were one of the chief features. Special interest attached to these collections, since little accurate knowledge was available, owing to the fact that the skins exported had been procured in consequence of the hateful demands created by French plumassiers, &c. Though labelled indiscriminately "Trinidad," many of them had been collected on the mainland of Venezuela. Wise legislation in the West Indies has placed some check upon the slaughter of the Hummers, though it has not been entirely stamped out.
There is an old collection of birds in the Victoria Institute which comprises 356 separate species, made by the late Dr. Leotaud, and it includes fourteen different kinds of Humming Birds. The following birds I obtained:—
Lampornis violicauda, Bodd. "The Mango-hummer."—As with most other members of this family at the time of year I collected, the chief resort of this species was the "bois immortel" tree, which was then in flower. Two varieties of this tree have been imported, and it is extensively used as "shade" for young cocoa and nutmeg plantations. Though the flowers are different in shade and size, they are apparently both very melliferous, being equally patronized by these birds. There is a popular belief, as ill-grounded as most others, that Humming-birds never perch; this seems almost superfluous to contradict, but let me say that it is their constant practice (though they feed on the wing only, and may visit several trees for that purpose) to resort to a favourite perching-twig to rest in the intervals.
Chrysolampis mosquitus, Linn. "Ruby Topaz."—The commonest species in both Trinidad and Tobago; the specimens I collected cleared up a doubtful point bearing on the plumage of
