. , of laying. In the woods has ,no brilliancy ; its fine-coloured plumage is not discovered, and the tints of the female are dull. It loves to take its station on tin's teak-trees (Arbres do Tuck), whose ample foliage shelters it, and whose small fruit forms its nourishment, Its irides are brown, and the feet are of a delicate azure. The Papuans call it Says.
"Soon after our arrival on this land of promise (New Guinea) for the naturalist, I was on a shooting excursion. Scarcely had I walked some hundred paces in those ancient forests, the daughters of time, whose sombre depth was perhaps the most magnificent and stately sight that I had ever seed, when a Bird of Paradise struck my view : it flew gracefully and in undulations ; the feathers of its sides formed an elegant and aerial plume, which without exaggeration bore no remote resemblance to a brilliant meteor. Surprised, astounded, enjoying an inexpressible gratification, I devoured this splendid bird with my eyes ; but my emotion was so great that I forgot to shoot at it, and did not recollect that I had a gun in my hand till it was far away.
"One can scarcely have a just idea of the Paradise-Birds from the skins which the Papuans sell to the Malays, and which come to us in Europe. These people formerly hunted the birds to decorate the turbans of their chiefs. . They call them Mambefore in their tongue, 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 (rachis) of the leaves of a palm (latanier). The campongs or villages of Mappia and of Emherbakene are celebrated for the quantity of birds which they prepare, and all the art of their 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 their 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 tho 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, voiko,' strongly articulated. The cry of the female is the same, but she raises it much more feebly. The latter, deprived of the brilliant plumage of the male, is clad in sombre attire. We met with them; assembled in scores, on every tree while the males, always solitary, appeared but rarely.
"It is at tho rising and setting of the sun that the Bird of Paradise goes to seek its food. In the middle of the day it remains hidden under the ample foliage of the teak-tree, and comes not forth. He seems to dread the scorching rays of the sun, and to be unwilling to expose himself to the attacks of a rival.. . . .
"In order to shoot Birds of Paradise, travellers who visit New Guinea should remember that it is necessary to leave the ship early in the morning, to arrive at the foot of a teak-tree or fig-tree, which these birds frequent for tho sako of their fruit—(our stay was from the 26th of July to the 9th of August)—before half-past four, and to remain motionless till some of the males, urged by hunger, light upon the branches within range. It is indispensably requisite to have a gun which will carry very far with effect, and that the grains of shot should be large ; for it is very difficult to kill an Emerald outright, and if he be only wounded it is very seldom that lie is not lost in thickets so dense that there is no finding the way without a compass.