Nor can the exigencies of protection have evolved the glaring colors of the West Indian hornbill. The _toco_ (toucan), as the Cubans call the yellow-billed species, can be descried from a distance of two hundred yards, and is, indeed, not anxious to be admired at close range. Old specimens get as wary as mountain ravens, but, like crows, become ridiculously tame in captivity, and will follow their proprietors with loud croaks, every now and then opening their lunch-trap to indicate their desire for refreshment. They are, on the whole, the hardiest of all tropical birds, and can weather the winters of our coast towns as far north as Wilmington, in open-air cages, owing perhaps to their habit of extending their excursions to the high mountain ranges of their native land. [Illustration: THE SMALLEST BIRD.] Economical Nature rarely wastes the gift of song on a bird of bright plumage, but it is less easy to understand why so many feathered beauties should have been afflicted with harsh and positively repulsive voices. The horrid screams of the peacocks, guinea hens, and macaws can hardly be supposed to charm their mates, and are too easily recognized to deter their natural enemies. But the roars (there is no more adequate word) of some species of hornbills would almost seem intended to serve the latter purpose. "The voice of the _Buceros bicornis_," says Wallace, "can be plainly heard at a distance of a mile, so that the amazement of travelers visiting its haunts seems explicable enough. Its screams may be described as something between the bray of a jackass and the shriek of a locomotive, and are not surpassed in power by any sound that an animal is capable of making. They re-echo through the hills to such a degree that it is difficult to assign the noise to a bird, and are sometimes kept up so continuously as to become absolutely unbearable." The condor and the harpy eagle have not found their way across the Caribbean Sea, but the West Indies boast three varieties of fish eagles, several species of mountain falcons, and a curious singing owl, the _oriya_, that chants its serenades in the plaintive strain of the whip-poor-will, and is dreaded by the Porto Rico darkeys as a bird of ill-omen: "Grita l'oriya: Venga amigo, Venga conmigo a mi patria, Venga te-digo!" Small hooting owls abound, and there are four species of sparrow hawks, one of them not much larger than a finch.