Page:Natural History, Birds.djvu/154

 Europe. These people formerly hunted the birds to decorate the turbans of their chiefs. They call them mambéfore in their language, and kill them during the night by climbing the trees where they perch, and shooting them with arrows made for the purpose, and very short, which they make with the stem of the leaves of a palm. &hellip; All the art of the inhabitants is directed to taking off the feet, skinning, thrusting a little stick through the body, and drying it in the smoke. Some, more adroit, at the solicitation of the Chinese merchants, dry them with the feet on. The price of a Bird of Paradise among the Papuans of the coast, is a piastre at least. We killed, during our stay at New Guinea, a score of these birds, which I prepared, for the most part.

"The Emerald, when alive, is of the size of a common Jay; its beak and its feet are bluish; the irides are of a brilliant yellow; its motions are lively and agile; and, in general, it never perches except upon the summit of the most lofty trees. When it descends, it is for the purpose of eating the fruits of the lesser trees, or when the sun in full power compels it to seek the shade. It has a fancy for certain trees, and makes the neighbourhood re-echo with its piercing voice. The cry became fatal, because it indicated to us the movements of the bird. We were on the watch for it, and it was thus that we came to kill these birds; for when a male Bird of Paradise has perched, and hears a rustling in the silence of the forest, he is silent, and does not move. His call is voike, voike, voike, voiko, strongly articulated. The cry of the female is the same, but she raises it much more feebly. The latter, deprived of the