CAROLINA PAROQUET. 429 



lowing the great valley of the Mississippi, they are seen to 

 frequent the banks of the Illinois, and occasionally to approach 

 the southern shores of Lake Michigan. Straggling parties 

 even have sometimes been seen in the valley of the Juniata in 

 Pennsylvania, and a flock, to the great surprise of the Dutch 

 inhabitants of Albany, are said to have appeared in that vicin- 

 ity. They constantly inhabit and breed in the Southern States, 

 and are so far hardy as to make their appearance, commonly 

 in the depth of winter, along the woody banks of the Ohio, 

 the interior of Alabama, the banks of the Mississippi and 

 Missouri around St. Louis, and other places, when nearly all 

 other birds have migrated before the storms of the season. 



The Carolina Parrakeets in all their movements, which are 

 uniformly gregarious, show a peculiar predilection for the allu- 

 vial, rich, and dark forests bordering the principal rivers and 

 larger streams, in which the towering cypress and gigantic 

 sycamore spread their vast summits, or stretch their innumer- 

 able arms over a wide waste of moving or stagnant waters. 

 From these, the beech, and the hack-berry, they derive an 

 important supply of food. The flocks, moving in the manner 

 of wild Pigeons, dart in swift and airy phalanx through the 

 green boughs of the forest ; screaming in a general concert, they 

 wheel in wide and descending circles round the tall button- 

 wood, and all alight at the same instant, their green vesture, 

 like the fairy mantle, rendering them nearly invisible beneath 

 the shady branches, where they sit perhaps arranging their 

 plumage and shuffling side by side, seeming to caress and 

 scratch each other's heads with all the fondness and unvarying 

 friendship of affectionate Doves. If the gun thin their ranks 

 they hover over the screaming, wounded, or dying, and return- 

 ing and flying around the place where they miss their compan- 

 ions, in their sympathy seem to lose all idea of impending 

 danger. When more fortunate in their excursions, they next 

 proceed to gratify the calls of hunger, and descend to the 

 banks of the river or the neighboring fields in quest of the 

 inviting kernels of the cockle-burr, and probably of the bitter- 

 weed, which they extract from their husks with great dexterity. 



