130 ASH-COLOURED OR GREY PAROT. 



youth and vigour it had been distinguished for its 

 colloquial powers, and distinct enunciation, and was 

 of so docile and obedient a disposition, as to fetch its 

 master's slippers when required, as well as to call the 

 servants, &c. At the age of sixty, its memory began to 

 fail, and, instead of acquiring any new phrase, it began 

 to lose those it had before attained, and to intermix, 

 in a discordant manner, the words of its former lan- 

 guage. It moulted regularly every year till the age 

 of sixty-five, when this process grew irregular, and 

 the tail became yellow, after which, no farther change 

 of plumage took place. It is subject to variety, as 

 shewn in the figure of Edwards, where the ground 

 volour is mixed wilji red. In size it measures about 

 1 2 inches in length. The bill is black, strong, and 

 much hooked, and the orbits, and space between them 

 and the eyes, covered with a naked and white skin 

 The whole of the plumage, with the exception of th* 

 tail, which is of a bright deep scarlet, is of an ash- 

 grey colour, deepest upon the back, and the feathers 

 finely relieved and margined with paler grey. The 

 irides are of a pale yellowish-white, the feet and toes 

 grey, tinged with flesh-red. 



The limited number of engravings not admitting 

 of a figure illustrative of every group, we can only 

 -emedy the deficiency by a description of such spe- 

 cies as are remarkable, or typical of their respective 

 genera. The Short and Even-tailed Parrots, as pre- 

 viously observed, have been divided by Wagler into 



