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“Cordon Bleus and Common Waxbills are the next most noticeable

birds. These, although they do not actually live in the villages, are confined,

like all the small seed-eaters, to the cultivated ground immediately

surrounding the villages ; here any day one sees, besides the above,

Lavender Finches, Zebra Waxbills, Singing Finches and many other small

seed-eaters, while Glossy Starlings (both Long-tailed and Purple), Pipits,

Reed Cuckoos, and Warblers in hundreds, represent the soft-billed birds.”



A specimen of the Racket-tailed Tarrot (Prioniturus platurus ), from

the Celebes, imported by our esteemed member, Mr. E. W. Harper, has just

been purchased by the Zoological Society of London, and is now on view

in the Parrot-house. This is the first example of this species received by

the Society, and in all probability the first ever imported alive to Europe.

Space will not permit of our describing the bird here, but no one, who is

interested in the Psittacidcs should fail to inspect it. We may mention that

the spatules or ‘ rackets’ have been broken off on the journey from India,

but otherwise it is in good plumage.



TO MY PARROT.



Child of the South who hast wandered here

An old man’s home with thy love to cheer,


Lovely thy plumage and gentle thy ways,


Long mayst thou rest here to gladden my days.

Where was thy home ere thou earnest to me ?


Was it deep in some forest, high up in some tree?

Was it low — near the ground, by some rivulet’s brink

Where the wild herds troop for their evening drink ?

Where are the friends that were left behind

When your lot was cast with the human kind ?


Where is thy mother left alone and forlorn

When her nest was robbed on that sunny morn,


And her loved ones scattered the wide world through

To share the fate that was meted to you ?


What matter the others ! so thou art with me

As blithe and as happy as bird can well be.


’Tis passing strange that such friendship should be

’Twixt beings so diverse as you and me.


But who can tell what Love may do

Or where his arrows may penetrate through ?


Still nought shall be wanting that I can see

To brighten thy life and care for thee.


Shall we meet when we reach that happy shore

Where old friends meet to part no more ?


Ah ! who can tell ! but this we do know

That we love one another now here below.



L. IIaspope.



