528 MACAW 
others break it up into three or four genera as is done by Count T. 
Salvadori (Cat. B. Br. Mus. xx. pp. 145-169). Most of the Macaws 
are remarkable for their gaudy plumage, which exhibits the brightest 
scarlet, yellow, blue and green in varying proportion and often in 
violent contrast, while a white visage often adds a very peculiar and 
expressive character... With one exception the known species 
inhabit the mainland of America from Paraguay to Mexico, being 
especially abundant in Bolivia, where no fewer than seven of them 
(or nearly one-half) have been found (Proc. Zool. Soc. 1879, p. 634). 
The single extra-continental species, A. tricolor, is one of the most 
brilliantly coloured, and is peculiar to Cuba, where, according to 
Dr. Gundlach (Ornitologia Cubana, p. 126), its numbers are rapidly 
decreasing, so that there is every chance of its becoming extinct.” 
It will be enough here to dwell on the best-known species of 
the group, and first the Blue-and-yellow Macaw, 4. ararauna, which 
has an extensive range in South America from Guiana in the east 
to Colombia in the west. Southwards it is replaced in Paraguay by 
the nearly allied 4. caninde. Of large size, it is to be seen in 
almost every zoological garden, and is frequently kept alive in private 
houses, for its temper is pretty good, and it will become strongly 
attached to those who tend it. Its richly-coloured plumage, suffi- 
ciently indicated by its common English name, has the additional 
recommendation of supplying feathers which are eagerly sought by 
salmon-fishers for the making of “flies.” Next may be mentioned the 
Red-and-blue Macaw, 4. macao, which is even larger and more 
gorgeously clothed, for, beside the colours expressed in its ordinary 
appellation, yellow and green enter into its adornment. It inhabits 
Central as well as South America as far as Bolivia, and is also a 
which, considering that now one West Indian island only is known to possess a 
Macaw (and that in that island the bird is known as Guacamayo), is very un- 
likely. Some of the older writers, Buffon (Oiseaux, vi. p. 278) for instance, say 
that Makavowanne was the name given by natives of Guiana to one species of 
Macaw found in that country ; but the Antillean origin of the name cannot at 
present be accepted. 
1 This serves to separate the Macaws from the long-tailed Parrakeets of the 
New World, Conwrus, to which they are very nearly allied; and Count T. 
Salvadori (ut supra) places them indeed in the same subfamily, which in that 
case should bear the name of Arinz instead of Conurine. 
2 There is good reason to think that Jamaica formerly possessed a Macaw 
(though no example is known to exist), and if so it was most likely a peculiar 
species. Sloane (Voyage, ii. p. 297), after describing what he calls the ‘‘ Great 
Maccaw” (A. ararauna, to be spoken of in the text), which he had seen in captiv- 
ity in that island, mentions the ‘‘Small Maccaw” as being very common in the 
woods there, and Gosse (B. Jamaica, p. 260) gives, on the authority of Robinson, a 
local naturalist of the last century, the description of a bird which cannot be 
reconciled with any species now known, though it evidently must have been 
allied to the Cuban A. tricolor (see EXTERMINATION, p. 220), 
