Wanderings in South America

As you advance towards the mountains of Demerara, other species of humming-birds present themselves before you.  It seems to be an erroneous opinion that the humming-bird lives entirely on honey-dew.  Almost every flower of the tropical climate contains insects of one kind or other; now, the humming-bird is most busy about the flowers an hour or two after sunrise and after a shower of rain, and it is just at this time that the insects come out to the edge of the flower in order that the sun’s rays may dry the nocturnal dew and rain which they have received.  On opening the stomach of the humming-bird, dead insects are almost always found there.

Next to the humming-birds, the cotingas display the gayest plumage.  They are of the order of passeres, and you number five species betwixt the sea-coast and the rock Saba.  Perhaps the scarlet cotinga is the richest of the five, and is one of those birds which are found in the deepest recesses of the forest.  His crown is flaming red; to this abruptly succeeds a dark shining brown, reaching half-way down the back: the remainder of the back, the rump, and tail, the extremity of which is edged with black, are a lively red; the belly is a somewhat lighter red; the breast, reddish-black; the wings, brown.  He has no song, is solitary, and utters a monotonous whistle which sounds like “quet.”  He is fond of the seeds of the hitia-tree, and those of the siloabali and bastard-siloabali trees, which ripen in December, and continue on the trees for about two months.  He is found throughout the year in Demerara; still nothing is known of his incubation.  The Indians all agree in telling you that they have never seen his nest.

The purple-breasted cotinga has the throat and breast of a deep purple, the wings and tail black, and all the rest of the body a most lively shining blue.

The purple-throated cotinga has black wings and tail, and every other part a light and glossy blue, save the throat, which is purple.

The pompadour cotinga is entirely purple, except his wings, which are white, their four first feathers tipped with brown.  The great coverts of the wings are stiff, narrow, and pointed, being shaped quite different from those of any other bird.  When you are betwixt this bird and the sun in his flight, he appears uncommonly brilliant.  He makes a hoarse noise, which sounds like “wallababa.”  Hence his name amongst the Indians.

None of these three cotingas have a song.  They feed on the hitia, siloabali, and bastard-siloabali seeds, the wild guava, the fig, and other fruit trees of the forest.  They are easily shot in these trees during the months of December, January, and part of February.  The greater part of them disappear after this, and probably retire far away to breed.  Their nests have never been found in Demerara.

The fifth species is the celebrated campanero of the Spaniards, called dara by the Indians and bell-bird by the English.  He is about the size of the jay.  His plumage is white as snow.  On his forehead rises a spiral tube nearly three inches long.  It is jet-black, dotted all over with small white feathers.  It has a communication with the palate, and when filled with air, looks like a spire; when empty, it becomes pendulous.  His note is loud and clear, like the sound of a bell, and may be heard at the distance of three miles.  In the midst of these extensive wilds, generally on the dried top of an aged mora, almost out of gun reach, you will see the campanero.  No sound or song from any of the winged inhabitants of the forest, not even the clearly-pronounced “Whip-poor-Will,” from the goatsucker, causes such astonishment as the toll of the campanero.

With many of the feathered race, he pays the common tribute of a morning and an evening song; and even when the meridian sun has shut in silence the mouths of almost the whole of animated nature, the campanero still cheers the forest.  You hear his toll, and then a pause for a minute, then another toll, and then a pause again, and then a toll, and again a pause.  Then he is silent for six or eight minutes, and then, another toll, and so on.  Actæon would stop in mid chase, Maria would defer her evening song, and Orpheus himself would drop his lute to listen to him, so sweet, so novel, and romantic is the toll of the pretty snow-white campanero.  He is never seen to feed with the other cotingas, nor is it known in what part of Guiana he makes his nest.

While cotingas attract your attention by their superior plumage, the singular form of the toucan makes a lasting impression on your memory.  There are three species of toucans in Demerara, and three diminutives, which may be called toucanets.  The largest of the first species frequents the mangrove-trees on the sea-coast.  He is never seen in the interior till you reach Macoushia, where he is found in the neighbourhood of the river Tacatou.  The other two species are very common.  They feed entirely on the fruits of the forest, and though of the pie kind, never kill the young of other birds or touch carrion.  The larger is called bouradi by the Indians (which means “nose”), the other, scirou.  They seem partial to each other’s company, and often resort to the same feeding tree, and retire together to the same shady noon-day retreat.  They are very noisy in rainy weather at all hours of the day, and in fair weather, at morn and eve.  The sound which the bouradi makes is like the clear yelping of a puppy dog, and you fancy he says, “pia-po-o-co,” and thus the South American Spaniards call him piapoco.

All the toucanets feed on the same trees on which the toucan feeds, and every species of this family of enormous bill lays its eggs in the hollow trees.  They are social, but not gregarious.  You may sometimes see eight or ten in company, and from this you would suppose they are gregarious; but, upon a closer examination, yon will find it has only been a dinner party, which breaks up and disperses towards roosting-time.

You will be at a loss to conjecture for what ends nature has overloaded the head of this bird with such an enormous bill.  It cannot be for the offensive, as it has no need to wage war with any of the tribes of animated nature; for its food is fruits and seeds, and those are in superabundance throughout the whole year in the regions where the toucan is found.  It can hardly be for the defensive, as the toucan is preyed upon by no bird in South America, and were it obliged to be at war, the texture of the bill is ill adapted to give or receive blows, as you will see in dissecting it.  It cannot be for any particular protection to the tongue, as the tongue is a perfect feather.

The flight of the toucan is by jerks; in the action of flying it seems incommoded by this huge disproportioned feature, and the head seems as if bowed down to the earth by it against its will; if the extraordinary form and size of the bill expose the toucan to ridicule, its colours make it amends.  Were a specimen of each species of the toucan presented to you, you would pronounce the bill of the bouradi the most rich and beautiful; on the ridge of the upper mandible a broad stripe of most lovely yellow extends from the head to the point; a stripe of the same breadth, though somewhat deeper yellow, falls from it at right angles next the head down to the edge of the mandible; then follows a black stripe, half as broad, falling at right angles from the ridge, and running narrower along the edge to within half an inch of the point.  The rest of the mandible is a deep bright red.  The lower mandible has no yellow; its black and red are distributed in the same manner as on the upper one, with this difference, that there is black about an inch from the point.  The stripe corresponding to the deep yellow stripe on the upper mandible is sky blue.  It is worthy of remark that all these brilliant colours of the bill are to be found in the plumage of the body, and the bare skin round the eye.

All these colours, except the blue, are inherent in the horn; that part which appears blue is in reality transparent white, and receives its colour from a thin piece of blue skin inside.  This superb bill fades in death, and in three or four days’ time has quite lost its original colours.

Till within these few years no idea of the true colours of the bill could be formed from the stuffed toucans brought to Europe.  About eight years ago, while eating a boiled toucan, the thought struck me that the colours in the bill of a preserved specimen might be kept as bright as those in life.  A series of experiments proved this beyond a doubt.  If you take your penknife and cut away the roof of the upper mandible, you will find that the space betwixt it and the outer shell contains a large collection of veins, and small osseous fibres running in all directions through the whole extent of the bill.  Clear away all these with your knife, and you will come to a substance more firm than skin, but of not so strong a texture as the horn itself; cut this away also, and behind it is discovered a thin and tender membrane: yellow where it has touched the yellow part of the horn, blue where it has touched the red part, and black towards the edge and point.  When dried, this thin and tender membrane becomes nearly black; as soon as it is cut away, nothing remains but the outer horn, red and yellow, and now become transparent.  The under mandible must undergo the same operation.  Great care must be taken, and the knife used very cautiously when you are cutting through the different parts close to where the bill joins on to the head: if you cut away too much, the bill drops off; if you press too hard, the knife comes through the horn; if you leave too great a portion of the membrane, it appears through the horn, and by becoming black when dried, makes the horn appear black also, and has a bad effect.  Judgment, caution, skill, and practice will ensure success.

You have now cleared the bill of all those bodies which are the cause of its apparent fading; for, as has been said before, these bodies dry in death, and become quite discoloured, and appear so through the horn; and reviewing the bill in this state, you conclude that its former bright colours are lost.

Something still remains to be done.  You have rendered the bill transparent by the operation, and that transparency must be done away to make it appear perfectly natural.  Pound some clean chalk, and give it enough water till it be of the consistency of tar; add a proportion of gum-arabic to make it adhesive; then take a camel-hair brush, and give the inside of both mandibles a coat; apply a second when the first is dry, then another, and a fourth to finish all.  The gum-arabic will prevent the chalk from cracking and falling off.  If you remember, there is a little space of transparent white on the lower mandible which originally appeared blue, but which became transparent white as soon as the thin piece of blue skin was cut away; this must be painted blue inside.  When all this is completed, the bill will please you; it will appear in its original colours.  Probably your own abilities will suggest a cleverer mode of operating than the one here described.  A small gouge would assist the penknife, and render the operation less difficult.

The houtou ranks high in beauty amongst the birds of Demerara—his whole body is green, with a bluish cast in the wings and tail; his crown, which he erects at pleasure, consists of black in the centre, surrounded with lovely blue of two different shades: he has a triangular black spot, edged with blue, behind the eye, extending to the ear; and on his breast a sable tuft, consisting of nine feathers edged also with blue.  This bird seems to suppose that its beauty can be increased by trimming the tail, which undergoes the same operation as our hair in a barber’s shop, only with this difference, that it uses its own beak, which is serrated, in lieu of a pair of scissors; as soon as his tail is full grown, he begins about an inch from the extremity of the two longest feathers in it, and cuts away the web on both sides of the shaft, making a gap about an inch long; both male and female Adonise their tails in this manner, which gives them a remarkable appearance amongst all other birds.  While we consider the tail of the houtou blemished and defective, were he to come amongst us he would probably consider our heads, cropped and bald, in no better light.  He who wishes to observe this handsome bird in his native haunts must be in the forest at the morning’s dawn.  The houtou shuns the society of man: the plantations and cultivated parts are too much disturbed to engage it to settle there; the thick and gloomy forests are the places preferred by the solitary houtou.  In those far-extending wilds, about daybreak, you hear him articulate, in a distinct and mournful tone, “Houtou, houtou.”  Move cautiously on to where the sound proceeds from, and you will see him sitting in the underwood, about a couple of yards from the ground, his tail moving up and down every time he articulates “houtou.”  He lives on insects and the berries amongst the underwood, and very rarely is seen in the lofty trees, except the bastard-siloabali tree, the fruit of which is grateful to him.  He makes no nest, but rears his young in a hole in the sand, generally on the side of a hill.

While in quest of the houtou you will now and then fall in with the jay of Guiana, called by the Indians ibibirou.  Its forehead is black, the rest of the head white; the throat and breast like the English magpie: about an inch of the extremity of the tail is white, the other part of it, together with the back and wings, a greyish changing purple; the belly is white: there are generally six or eight of them in company; they are shy and garrulous, and tarry a very short time in one place; they are never seen in the cultivated parts.

Through the whole extent of the forest, chiefly from sunrise till nine o’clock in the morning, you hear a sound of “Wow, wow, wow, wow.”  This is the bird called boclora by the Indians.  It is smaller than the common pigeon, and seems, in some measure, to partake of its nature; its head and breast are blue; the back and rump somewhat resemble the colour on the peacock’s neck; its belly is a bright yellow; the legs are so very short that it always appears as if sitting on the branch; it is as ill-adapted for walking as the swallow; its neck, for above an inch all round, is quite bare of feathers, but this deficiency is not seen, for it always sits with its head drawn in upon its shoulders: it sometimes feeds with the cotingas on the guava and hitia trees; but its chief nutriment seems to be insects, and, like most birds which follow this prey, its chaps are well armed with bristles: it is found in Demerara at all times of the year, and makes a nest resembling that of the stock-dove.  This bird never takes long flights, and when it crosses a river or creek it goes by long jerks.

The boclora is very unsuspicious, appearing quite heedless of danger: the report of a gun within twenty yards will not cause it to leave the branch on which it is sitting, and you may often approach it so near as almost to touch it with the end of your bow.  Perhaps there is no bird known whose feathers are so slightly fixed to the skin as those of the boclora.  After shooting it, if it touch a branch in its descent, or if it drop on hard ground, whole heaps of feathers fall off; on this account it is extremely hard to procure a specimen for preservation.  As soon as the skin is dry in the preserved specimen, the feathers become as well fixed as those in any other bird.

Another species, larger than the boclora, attracts much of your notice in these wilds; it is called cuia by the Indians, from the sound of its voice; its habits are the same as those of the boclora, but its colours different; its head, breast, back, and rump are a shining, changing green; its tail not quite so bright; a black bar runs across the tail towards the extremity; and the outside feathers are partly white, as in the boclora; its belly is entirely vermilion, a bar of white separating it from the green on the breast.

There are diminutives of both these birds; they have the same habits, with a somewhat different plumage, and about half the size.  Arrayed from head to tail in a robe of richest sable hue, the bird called rice-bird loves spots cultivated by the hand of man.  The woodcutter’s house on the hills in the interior, and the planter’s habitation on the sea-coast, equally attract this songless species of the order of pie, provided the Indian corn be ripe there.  He is nearly of the jackdaw’s size, and makes his nest far away from the haunts of men; he may truly be called a blackbird: independent of his plumage, his beak, inside and out, his legs, his toes, and claws, are jet black.

Mankind, by clearing the ground, and sowing a variety of seeds, induces many kinds of birds to leave their native haunts and come and settle near him; their little depredations on his seeds and fruits prove that it is the property, and not the proprietor, which has the attractions.

One bird, however, in Demerara, is not actuated by selfish motives; this is the cassique; in size, he is larger than the starling; he courts the society of man, but disdains to live by his labours.  When nature calls for support, he repairs to the neighbouring forest, and there partakes of the store of fruits and seeds which she has produced in abundance for her aërial tribes.  When his repast is over, he returns to man, and pays the little tribute which he owes him for his protection; he takes his station on a tree close to his house, and there, for hours together, pours forth a succession of imitative notes.  His own song is sweet, but very short.  If a toucan be yelping in the neighbourhood, he drops it, and imitates him.  Then he will amuse his protector with the cries of the different species of the woodpecker; and when the sheep bleat, he will distinctly answer them.  Then comes his own song again; and if a puppy-dog or a Guinea-fowl interrupt him, he takes them off admirably, and by his different gestures during the time, you would conclude that he enjoys the sport.

The cassique is gregarious, and imitates any sound he hears with such exactness, that he goes by no other name than that of mocking-bird amongst the colonists.

At breeding-time, a number of these pretty choristers resort to a tree near the planter’s house, and from its outside branches weave their pendulous nests.  So conscious do they seem that they never give offence, and so little suspicious are they of receiving any injury from man, that they will choose a tree within forty yards from his house, and occupy the branches so low down, that he may peep into the nests.  A tree in Waratilla creek affords a proof of this.

The proportions of the cassique are so fine, that he may be said to be a model of symmetry in ornithology.  On each wing he has a bright yellow spot, and his rump, belly, and half the tail are of the same colour.  All the rest of the body is black.  His beak is the colour of sulphur, but it fades in death, and requires the same operation as the bill of the toucan to make it keep its colours.  Up the rivers, in the interior, there is another cassique, nearly the same size, and of the same habits, though not gifted with its powers of imitation.  Except in breeding time, you will see hundreds of them retiring to roost, amongst the mocamoca-trees and low shrubs on the banks of the Demerara, after you pass the first island.  They are not common on the sea-coast.  The rump of the cassique is a flaming scarlet.  All the rest of the body is a rich glossy black.  His bill is sulphur colour.  You may often see numbers of this species weaving their pendulous nests on one side of a tree, while numbers of the other species are busy in forming theirs on the opposite side of the same tree.  Though such near neighbours, the females are never observed to kick up a row, or come to blows!

Another species of cassique, as large as a crow, is very common in the plantations.  In the morning he generally repairs to a large tree, and there, with his tail spread over his back, and shaking his lowered wings, he produces notes which, though they cannot be said to amount to a song, still have something very sweet and pleasing in them.  He makes his nest in the same form as the other cassiques.  It is above four feet long; and when you pass under the tree, which often contains fifty or sixty of them, you cannot help stopping to admire them as they wave to and fro, the sport of every storm and breeze.  The rump is chestnut; ten feathers of the tail are a fine yellow, the remaining two, which are the middle ones, are black, and an inch shorter than the others.  His bill is sulphur colour; all the rest of the body black, with here and there shades of brown.  He has five or six long narrow black feathers on the back of his head, which he erects at pleasure.

There is one more species of cassique in Demerara, which always prefers the forest to the cultivated parts.  His economy is the same as that of the other cassiques.  He is rather smaller than the last described bird.  His body is greenish, and his tail and rump paler than those of the former.  Half of his beak is red.

You would not be long in the forests of Demerara without noticing the woodpeckers.  You meet with them feeding at all hours of the day.  Well may they do so.  Were they to follow the example of most of the other birds, and only feed in the morning and evening, they would be often on short allowance, for they sometimes have to labour three or four hours at the tree before they get to their food.  The sound which the largest kind makes in hammering against the bark of the tree is so loud, that you would never suppose it to proceed from the efforts of a bird.  You would take it to be the woodman, with his axe, trying by a sturdy blow, often repeated, whether the tree were sound or not.  There are fourteen species here; the largest the size of a magpie, the smallest no bigger than the wren.  They are all beautiful; and the greater part of them have their heads ornamented with a fine crest, movable at pleasure.

It is said, if you once give a dog a bad name, whether innocent or guilty, he never loses it; it sticks close to him wherever he goes.  He has many a kick and many a blow to bear on account of it; and there is nobody to stand up for him.  The woodpecker is little better off.  The proprietors of woods in Europe have long accused him of injuring their timber, by boring holes in it, and letting in the water, which soon rots it.  The colonists in America have the same complaint against him.  Had he the power of speech, which Ovid’s birds possessed in days of yore, he could soon make a defence.  “Mighty lord of the woods,” he would say to man, “why do you wrongfully accuse me? why do you hunt me up and down to death for an imaginary offence?  I have never spoiled a leaf of your property, much less your wood.  Your merciless shot strikes me at the very time I am doing you a service.  But your short-sightedness will not let you see it, or your pride is above examining closely the actions of so insignificant a little bird as I am.  If there be that spark of feeling in your breast which they say man possesses, or ought to possess, above all other animals, do a poor injured creature a little kindness, and watch me in your woods only for one day.  I never wound your healthy trees.  I should perish for want in the attempt.  The sound bark would easily resist the force of my bill: and were I even to pierce through it, there would be nothing inside that I could fancy, or my stomach digest.  I often visit them, it is true, but a knock or two convince me that I must go elsewhere for support; and were you to listen attentively to the sound which my bill causes, you would know whether I am upon a healthy or an unhealthy tree.  Wood and bark are not my food.  I live entirely upon the insects which have already formed a lodgment in the distempered tree.  When the sound informs me that my prey is there, I labour for hours together till I get at it; and by consuming it, for my own support, I prevent its further depredations in that part.  Thus I discover for you your hidden and unsuspected foe, which has been devouring your wood in such secrecy, that you had not the least suspicion it was there.  The hole which I make in order to get at the pernicious vermin will be seen by you as you pass under the tree.  I leave it as a signal to tell you that your tree has already stood too long.  It is past its prime.  Millions of insects, engendered by disease, are preying upon its vitals.  Ere long it will fall a log in useless ruins.  Warned by this loss, cut down the rest in time, and spare, O spare the unoffending woodpecker.”