Page:The Zoologist, 4th series, vol 1 (1897).djvu/474

446 my kind friends Capt. M. Short and Mr. Trochilus Tucker in Tobago, I found it to be fairly common on the windward side of the island. It will not be out of place to mention that the last-named gentleman's father collected Humming-birds for the late Mr. Gould nearly thirty years ago, and, visiting him one morning by appointment in London, mentioned that he had received news by cable of the birth of another son. "Call him Trochilus," said Gould; and it was so arranged when Mr. Tucker returned to Iëre! The young birds have a barred throat and dirty white breast, as immature plumage.

Glaucis hirsuta, Gm. "Rachette."—This bird was very partial to the flowers of the balisiers which abound on the banks of streams and damp shady places. I took it both at Claxton's Bay in Trinidad and Tobago.

Agyrtria niveipectus, Cab. and Heine. "Gorge blanc."—Found both in the Caparo Valley and Savana Grande districts of Trinidad, but I did not observe it in Tobago.

Amazilia tobaci, Gm.—It was not until I visited Tobago that I secured skins of this bird; the first one I shot was on my way to Robinson Crusoe's cave. Though I visited this historic cave in a vain attempt to secure the Fish-eating Bat, Noctilio leporinus, Linn., it was a sad awakening to view the reality, after the boyish remembrances I retained of Defoe's charming romance. In a few years there will no cave at all, and now the action of the waves—for it is on the windward side of the island—has reduced it to a mere cupboard of stalactitic limestone, in which you cannot stand upright, and the roof is so cracked that it looked as if the report of a gun might bring the whole thing down about one's ears.

Campylopterus ensipennis, Sw.—In size this was the largest of all my West Indian Hummers. I saw it nowhere, save on the Richmond Estate in Tobago, and then always on the wing.

Bellona ornata, Gould.—Though the male of this bird was very common in St. Vincent, I still had the greatest difficulty in obtaining a female, and when I did I also obtained the nest and eggs of the bird. The nest was built in the mouth of a small cave high up in the Wallilabo Valley, where I stayed with my hospitable friends, the MacDonalds, for the purpose of collecting.