THE CAROLINA PAROQUET 239 



cultivated fruits became so common, the favourite 

 food of this Paroquet consisted of the seeds of the 

 cocklebur and sycamore, as well as those of the 

 cypress and pecan, together with beech nuts, the 

 fruit of the papaw, mulberries, wild grapes, pine 

 cones, and the seeds of the bur grass. Their acquired 

 taste for such cultivated fruits as bananas and 

 oranges, and for Indian corn, has brought down 

 upon them the wrath of the cultivator, and their 

 consequent extermination. Upon the ground this 

 Paroquet is somewhat clumsy, but in the branches 

 it moves about with great agility, climbing here 

 and there amongst the slenderer twigs, often head 

 downwards, reaching and nipping off the buds 

 and berries and fruits on which it subsists, and 

 swinging itself from bough to bough with the 

 help of its strong beak. Its flight is described as 

 undulatory, rapid, and graceful ; and so agile are 

 the birds upon the wing, that they dart in and out 

 of the thickest timber with ease even when flying 

 in compact flocks. Their call-note is a shrill qui 

 repeated several times, the last utterance being 

 prolonged into a sound like qui-i-i-i, and is most 

 frequently heard during flight. When the bird 

 was more plentiful than it is now, it roamed 

 about in flocks numbering hundreds of individuals 



