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CHAPTER XXXI. 



THE EEDEUMP. 



THIS very beautiful Parrakeet, called by the Germans der 

 Singsittich, from the faculty of song it possesses, is one 

 of the most desirable birds that can be placed in a large 

 garden aviary. In a small enclosure it will not do, at least 

 all the specimens I have had have been of a most quarrelsome 

 and tyrannical disposition; but I may have been unfortunate 

 in my experience, for birds, like men, have each his own 

 special idiosyncrasy, and Dr. Euss is scarcely likely to have 

 made a mistake when he wrote concerning the bird under 

 consideration: " Vertraglich unter kleinen Vogeln,''^ (it is amiable 

 among small birds), which has certainly not been the case 

 with my Eedrumps, which have killed Canaries and Budger- 

 igars, and so persecuted their larger companions that I was 

 compelled to allow them an aviary to themselves: but given 

 plenty of room, or kept in a good- sized aviary by themselves, 

 they are charming birds, very easily tamed, and more readily 

 taught to go and come than almost any other bird. They 

 are very strong on the wing, and have a powerful and graceful 

 flight, which they are able to sustain for a considerable time, 

 and when wheeling round and round in the sunshine, look 

 like flashes of richly coloured light. There would not be 

 the least ditliculty in acclimatising the Eedrump, were it not 

 for cockney sportsmen, who must fire at, maim, or kill any 

 strange bird they chance to see flying about, even when 

 perfectly aware that it is the property of their next-door 

 neighbour quite as much as their pigeons and jDoultry belong 

 to them. 



The first time my cock Eedrump got out, and how he did 



