192 FEATHERED FRIENDS. 



his place, he informed me, it was impossible to conceive 

 anything more horrible than the picture they presented, 

 poor things 1 so I suspect he obtained them cheaply. 

 However, Anton was not the man to let grass grow 

 under his feet, or to sit down and cry for spilled milk, 

 so he turned to and by the aid of plenty of soap and 

 warm water soon made the birds as presentable 

 as was, under the circumstances, possible: but they 

 had been shamefully neglected during the voyage and 

 the best in their case was bad. 



When I saw the poor creatures, I was not impressed, 

 but Jamrach picked out the best-looking one of the 

 lot and I took it home with me, thinking that Pilate 

 would be charmed to meet a young fellow country- 

 bird of his again ; but he was not, indeed he treated it 

 with profound indifference and refused to recognize the 

 stranger as a kinsman. 



My new acquisition, however, did not live very long 

 to trouble anyone, and the four guineas I had paid 

 for it were lost to me and my heirs for ever, but I 

 did not regret them: I had made my speculation, it 

 had failed, and there was an end of it. 



Pilate was an exceedingly frugal bird and lived 

 mainly on Canary seed, of which he consumed a fair 

 quantity; he was very partial, however, to fruit, and 

 was particularly fond of grapes, which he would hold 

 up cleverly in one foot, and suck until every drop of 

 juice had been abstracted, from which I inferred, as 



