CAROLINA PARROT. 113 



my pocket. When I stopped for refreshment, I unbound my prisoner, 

 and gave it its allowance, which it generally despatched with great 

 dexterity, unhusking the seeds from the burr in a twinkling ; in doing 

 which it always employed its left foot to hold the burr, as did several 

 others that I kept for some time. I began to think that this might be 

 peculiar to the whole tribe, and that the whole were, if I may use the 

 expression, left-footed; but by shooting a number afterwards, while 

 engaged in eating mulberries, I found sometimes the left, sometimes the 

 right foot, stained with the fruit ; the other always clean ; from which, 

 and the constant practice of those I kept, it appears, that like the 

 human species in the use of their hands, they do not prefer one or the 

 other indiscriminately, but are either left or right-footed. But to return 

 to my prisoner. In recommitting it to " durance vile," we generally 

 had a quarrel ; during which it frequently paid me in kind for the 

 wound I had inflicted, and for depriving it of liberty, by cutting and 

 almost disabling several of my fingers with its sharp and powerful bill. 

 The path through the wilderness, between Nashville and Natchez, is in 

 some places bad beyond description. There are dangerous creeks to 

 swim, miles of morass to struggle through, rendered almost as gloomy 

 as night by a prodigious growth of timber, and an underwood of canes 

 and other evergreens ; while the descent into these sluggish streams is 

 often ten or fifteen feet perpendicular into a bed of deep clay. In some 

 of the worst of these places, where I had, as it were, to fight my way 

 through, the Paroquet frequently escaped from my pocket, obliging me 

 to dismount and pursue it through the worst of the morass, before I 

 could regain it. On these occasions I was several times tempted to 

 abandon it ; but I persisted in bringing it along. When at night I 

 encamped, in the woods, I placed it on the baggage beside me, where it 

 usually sat, with great composure, dozing and gazing at the fire till 

 morning. In this manner I carried it upwards of a thousand miles in 

 my pocket, where it was exposed all day to the jolting of the horse, but 

 regularly liberated at meal times, and in the evening, at which it always 

 expressed great satisfaction. In passing through the Chickasaw and 

 Choctaw nations, the Indians, wherever I stopped to feed, collected 

 around me, men, women and children, laughing and seeming wonder- 

 fully amused with the novelty of my companion. The Chickasaws 

 called it in their language '■'■ Kelinhj ^ but when they heard me call it 

 Poll, they soon repeated the name ; and wherever I chanced to stop 

 among these people, we soon became familiar with each other through 

 the medium of Poll. On arriving at Mr. Dunbar's, below Natchez, I 

 procured a cage, and placed it under the piazza, where by its call it 

 soon attracted the passing flocks, such is the attachment they have for 

 each other. Numerous parties frequently alighted on the trees imme- 

 diately above, keeping up a constant conversation with the prisoner 

 Vol. I.— 8 



