6 CHISHOLM, The "Lost" Paradise Parrot. Tisf juu" 



of these birds that "deserves to be revi\ ed from the semi-obscurity 

 of his book. 



"An hour before sunset," he says, "I left camp with my gun, 

 and soon caught sight of a pair of these Parrots,t male and 

 female, that were walking near an ant-hill, eating grass-seed. 

 After I had shot the male, the female flew up into a neigh- 

 bouring tree. I did not go at once to pick uj) the dead bird — 

 the fine scarlet feathers of the lower part of its belly, which 

 shone in the rays of the setting sun, could easily be seen in the 

 distance. Soon after, the female came flying down to her dead 

 mate. With her beak she repeatedly lifted the dead head up 

 from the ground, walked to and fro over the body, as though 

 to bring it to life again; then she flew away, but immediately 

 returned with some fme straws of grass in her beak, and laid 

 them before the dead bird, evidently for the purpose of getting 

 him to eat the seed. As this, too, was in vain, she began again 

 to raise her mate's head and to trample on the body, and finally 

 flew away to a tree just as darkness was coming on. I ap- 

 proached the tree, and a shot put an end to the faithful animal's 

 sorrow ." 



A LOSS AXD A SEARCH. 



That little tragedy will serve, fittmgly enough, as an intro- 

 duction to a dark i)eriod in the history of the species generally. 

 Possibly the sad phase had its genesis much earlier, with the 

 spread and stabilising of settlement. Howbeit, the fact is that 

 as the years went by the Paradise Parrots steadily decreased in 

 numbers. In time they became an unknown (|uantity on the 

 markets overseas. In time, too, they vanished from districts 

 where once they were a feature — a very beautiful feature— of 

 the sub-tropical landscape. The decimation attracted na par- 

 ticular attention in ornithological circles until 1915. Then Mr. 

 A. J. Campbell, C.M.B.O.U., wrote in The Emu (vol. 14, p. 

 167), an article entitled "Missing Birds," specifying in this re- 

 spect the I'aradise or Scarlet-shouldered Parrot (P. pulcherri- 

 miis), the Turquoisine or Chestnut-shouldered Parrot (Euphenia 

 pulchella) and the Night- Parrot (Geopsittaeus occideiitalis). 

 "It would be interesting to know," wrote Mr. Campbell, "if these 

 three beautiful Australian Parrots still exist or have been ex- 

 terminated. If the birds are extinct, what is the cause or causes 

 of their extinction?" After adding that "all that remain to-day 

 appear to be a few stuflfed specimais in collections." Mr. Camji- 

 bell suggested that perhaps Mr. Charles Rarnard. of Central 

 Queensland (now President of the R.A.O.U.) could state when 

 the P.eautiful Parrf)ts were last observed in his district. To this 

 query Mr. Barnard rejilied that his people had not seen one of 

 the "Parrots since the 1902 drought, at the same time under- 

 taking to look for the sjiecies at Fairfield station, an old haunt. 



t Lumholtz called the species Platycerats pulcherrimus. 



