37 



at the same time it proves that cantankerous and 

 malicious individuals occur in this species ; my own 

 experience coincides with that of Drs. Greene and 

 Russ ; but it will be seen later that it is not perfect. 

 To my mind, however, it is the parrot for a pet. 



Attractive qualities : — These are numerous, quite 

 apart from its beauty and interesting manner of rais- 

 ing the feathers of the nape. It is nothing less than 

 a libel to describe this bird as delicate and unteachable, 

 it is quite the reverse. My specimen would have 

 nothing to do with constant repetition, but has picked 

 up such phrases as the following : " Ernest" — " Ernie" 

 — "Ernest's here" — "Ernest's come" — "What's the 

 matter" — "What yer doing?" — "Whatever are you 

 doing?" — and others which it does not yet articulate 

 clearly. * 



When he wishes to come out of his cage, he comes 

 to the front and makes quite a noise with his mandi- 

 bles against the wires of cage, and calls out "open the 

 door." It is only noisy when left alone for a time, and 

 then it calls out loudly to attract attention ; fortunately 

 even this noise (which is going on as I write this) is 

 neither a discordant screech nor j^et unmusical ; and 

 its screams, for the above cannot be counted as such, 

 are of the same character, they are not often indulged 

 in, and an entire lack of harshness robs them of their 

 terror. My bird is quite a talented whistler and imi- 

 tates at times the Thrush with marvellous fidelity, and 

 is responsive to passers-by in the road ; a boy whist- 

 ling as he passes wakes him up at once and he nearly 

 always responds and practically in the same key. 



* This bird was photographed while talking: the attitude is very 

 characteristic. 



