THE MACCAWS. 



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THE GilEAT SCARLET jNIACCA'W.* 



The gorgeous 3Iaccaws form tlio genus 3Iacrocerciis of Vieillot. The face is either 

 naked, or merely striijed with feathery lines. The tail is very long, -u-edge-shaped, and 

 sharp-pointed. These birds, the largest and most magnificent of the parrot tribe, 

 inhabit South America. The great scarlet maccaw, when in jserfect plumage, sometimes 

 measures about three feet in length, the tail, of course, included. The prevailing 

 plumage is scarlet, as its name implies, the wings blue, the wing-coverts varied with j'ellow, 

 the cheeks white and wrinkled. It is certainly a very sumptuous creature, but after 

 all, rather too like a richly-liveried footman— an association somewhat strengthened by its 

 being so often seen as an inhabitant of lordly mansions, and surrounded by other menial 

 bipeds, almost as gorgeous as itself. Our feelings would no doubt have been different 

 had we ever witnessed their natural evolutions. "It is a grand sight in ornithology," says 

 Waterton, " to see thousands of aras fl.ying over your heads, low enough to let j'ou have a 

 full view of their flowinii; mantle." How delinhtful would it have been, on some bii"ht 

 and dewy morning, to have accomiwnied Lord Anson to view a magniliccnt rapid in the 

 island of Quibo. A fine river of transparent water there precipitates itself along a rocky 

 channel, forming numerous falls, and the great disrupted rocks which form its boundaiy 

 on either side are crowned with lofty forest trees. " While the commodore and those 

 who were with him were attentively viewing the place, and were remarking the different 

 blending of the watcvs, the rocks, and the woods, there came in sight, as it wci'e still 

 more to heighten and animate the prospect, a prodigious lliglit of maccaw.s, which, 

 hovering over this spot, and oflen whirling and playing on the wing about it, afforded a 

 most brilliant appearance by the glittering of the sun upon their varied plumage ; so that 

 some of the spectators could not refrain from a kind of transport when tlu-y recounted 

 the complicated beauties which occurred at this extraordinary waterfall." The blue and 

 yellow species t is little inferior to the preceding, cither in size or sumptuousness. It is 

 less common, and seems to have been first described by Aldrovandus, from a sjjccimen 



* I'»ittacus Aracanga. — Ln:li. 



1'. .\rmniiim, — bitui. 



