Our daily excursions took us far into the forest which invested the low, rounded hills in all directions. There were few trails, but a lack of undergrowth made walking easy. On one of our first hunting expeditions we found the rare ground-cuckoo (_Neomorphus_), a beautiful iridescent greenish-black bird which, on account of its terrestrial habits, has nearly lost the power of flight. Once before, I had seen this bird, and that was on the upper Orinoco, near the foot of Mount Duida. There the single individual was engaged in a curious game of tag with a tinamou; the birds chased one another about on the leaf-strewn ground, over logs, and through the underbrush, and jumped over one another’s back as if playing leap-frog. We also found the flat-billed motmot in considerable numbers. These birds usually clung to the lianas drooping in festoons and loops above the small mountain brooks, and were exceedingly stupid and unsuspicious. They uttered no note, and sat motionless many minutes at a time, silhouetted like dark, ragged spectres on their perches. Among the moss or green leaves their color blended well with the surroundings, and we doubtless passed numbers without being aware of their presence. Not all the birds inhabiting the forests at Alto Bonito are inconspicuously colored, however. There are gorgeous little tanagers, humming-birds, toucans, and trogons. The latter, especially, are creatures of such exquisite beauty that they seem to belong to a world more ethereal than our own; their brilliant scarlet or yellow breasts resemble a flower of dazzling color, for which the shimmering, metallic wing-coverts and back provide a resplendent setting. The bird is as fragile as it is beautiful, and was evidently not intended to be defiled by the touch of mortal hands. If a specimen is shot, many of the feathers are lost before the bird reaches the ground, and at the impact of the ground many more are shed. The skin is so delicate that it takes an expert to remove it, and even then the bird is the despair of field-naturalist and taxidermist alike.