as a reason for not quoting all the names given by the older authors. Wherever they could be with
certainty determined, they have been quoted under the species to which they are believed to refer. The
numerous divisions which more modern writers have deemed it necessary to propose will be given in
the proper place.
Latham, who added little or nothing to the previously recorded notices o f this group o f birds, enumerated
sixty-five species in his ‘ Index Ornithologicus,’ published in 1790, and ninety-five in the third volume o f
his ‘ General History o f Birds,’ which appeared in 1822. Of these about two-thirds are real species ; the
remainder cannot be determined, as they are so indefinitely described that it is impossible to ascertain
whether they are species or not.
In 1802 the ‘ Oiseaux dorés,’ the great French work o f Audebert and Vieillot, was given to the world.
In it, besides figures o f all the Jacamars and Promerops then known, were included seventy plates o f
Humming-Birds. These plates represent species which were then rare, but are now extremely common,
and which, although not so numerous as those contained in the later work o f Latham, had the advantage
o f being illustrated in a manner which was intended to convey some idea o f their brilliancy. In most
instances the species may be recognized ; in others they are doubtful. Independently o f the illustrations
above-mentioned, these authors attempted to explain the laws which produce the splendid colouring of
certain parts o f these beautiful birds, and have given a plate illustrative o f their views on the subject.
In 1823 appeared the second part o f the ornithological portion o f the ‘Tableau Encyclopédique et
Méthodique des Trois Règnes de la Nature,’ by Bonnaterre and Vieillot, with an enumeration o f ninety-four
species o f Humming-Birds, but no additional information as to their habits and manners. A few years later
(between 1829 and 1833) appeared M. Lesson’s well-known works, the ‘ Histoire Naturelle des Oiseaux-
mouches,’ * Histoire Naturelle des Colibris,’ and ‘ Les Trochilidées,’— publications which added considerably
to our previous knowledge o f the group, although they enumerate no more than 110 species. How little
progress, then, had been made towards an intimate acquaintance with these lovely birds between the date
o f the twelfth edition of the ‘ Systema Natura? ’ and that o f the last-named publications, a period of more
than seventy years !
If the illustrious Humboldt paid no very marked attention to the Trochilidoe, he must have noticed many
o f the fine species lately brought to light ; and it is therefore somewhat surprising that he should have
been so remarkably silent respecting them when writing the ‘ Personal Narrative ’ o f his travels in the new
world. It is to him and to his associate Bonpland, however, that I consider we are indebted for our
acquaintance with many o f them ; for the perusal o f the interesting account o f their enterprising travels has
doubtless created a desire in others to follow in their footsteps. Thus succeeding travellers, who have not
been slow to perceive how wonderfully different are the productions o f the great Andean ranges from those
o f the other parts o f South America, have ever been active in forming and transmitting to Europe collections
in nearly every department of science ; and no objects have been more assiduously sought for than the flying
gems which constantly greeted them at every turn and must have been always before their eyes. Among the
most eminent travellers who- have succeeded Humboldt are D ’Orbigny, Schomburgk, Tschudi, Castlenau,
Burmeister, and others, who, with more recent but less-known explorers, have added so largely to our
knowledge of the Trochilidoe. Both Frenchmen and Belgians have proceeded to South America to procure
supplies of these birds ; and dealers from those countries have established themselves in some of the cities
o f that part o f the world for the like purpose. From Sta. Fé de Bogota alone many thousands of skins
are annually sent to London and Paris, and sold as ornaments for the drawing-room and for scientific
purposes. The Indians readily learn the art o f skinning and preserving, and, as a certain amount of
emolument attends the collecting o f these objects, they often traverse great distances for the purpose of
procuring them ; districts more than a hundred miles stretching away from each side of Bogota are strictly
searched ; and hence it is that from these places alone we receive not less than seventy species of this
family o f birds. In like manner the residents o f many parts of Brazil employ their slaves in collecting,
skinning, and preserving them for the European market ; and many thousands are annually sent from Rio de
Janeiro, Bahia, and Pernambuco. They also supply the inmates o f the convents with many of the more
richly coloured species for the manufacture of artificial-feather flowers. How numerous, then, must these
birds be in their native wilds, and how wonderfully must they keep in check the peculiar kind of insect life
upon which they principally feed! doubtless, one o f the objects for which they were designed. After
these few cursory remarks, I proceed to give a general history of the group, the range and distribution of the
species, and such additional information as I have acquired during the course o f my labours.
“ The first mention which is made of the Humming-Birds,” says M. Lesson, “ in the narratives of the
adventurers who proceeded to America, not with the design o f studying its natural productions, but for the
discovery o f gold, dates from 1558, and is to be found in ‘ Les Singularités de la France Antarctique ’
(Brazil) of André Thévet and Jean de Léry, companions o f La Villegaignon, who attempted in 1555 to found
a French colony there ; but these superficial accounts would not have unfolded their natural history, had not
the old naturalists who published their observations at the commencement of the seventeenth century taken
care to make them better known ; and we find some good accounts of them in the voluminous compilation
o f Nieremberg, in the collection of fragments from the great works of Hernandez or Fernandez, and in those
o f Piso. Ximenez, Acosta, Gomara, Marcgrave, Garcilasso, and Dutertre often mention these birds, but their
remarks are so superficial that it would be o f little use to quote them now. Towards the end of the same
century Sir Hans Sloane, Catesby, Edwards, Brown, Father Labat, Plumier, Louis Feuillée, and Rochefort
gave tolerably complete figures and descriptions o f some of the species ; but it was not until the commencement
o f the eighteenth century that we became better acquainted with their natural history.”
It will be seen that little was really known respecting the Humming-Birds even at the end of the career
o f the great Linnæus. From Captain Cook both Pennant and Linneeus became aware that a species was
found as far north as Nootka Sound, while every voyager to the eastern shores o f North America brought
tidings of its representative in the T'ochilus Colubris. Jamaica, St. Domingo, and the smaller islands of the
West Indies furnished a fair quota of species inhabiting those countries ; and correspondents were speedily
established by Sloane, Brown, Edwards, and Catesby in Hispaniola, Demerara, and Brazil. Throughout all
these regions the Humming-Birds, and indeed their other zoological productions, were then but partially,
and only partially,‘known. The great primeval forests o f Brazil, the vast palm-covered districts o f the
deltas o f the Amazon and the Orinoco, the fertile flats and savannahs o f Demerara, the luxuriant and
beautiful region of Xalapa (the realm of perpetual spring) and other parts o f Mexico, were literally
untrodden ground by the ornithological collector. Up to this time the vast provinces o f the New World
had only been skirted ; all within was virgin land, wherein even the explorer had scarcely placed a foot,
and where the only human inhabitants were the wild children of nature—the Botacudos and other tribes of