in ANIMAL LIFE IN THE TROPICAL FORESTS 293 



that, more than any others, they serve to give a special char- 

 acter to equatorial ornithology. These are the Parrots, the 

 Pigeons, and the Picariae, to each of which groups we will 

 devote some attention. 



Parrots 



The parrots, forming the order Psittaci of naturalists, are 

 a remarkable group of fruit -eating birds, of such high and 

 peculiar organisation that they are often considered to stand 

 at the head of the entire class. They are pre-eminently 

 characteristic of the intertropical zone, being nowhere absent 

 within its limits (except from absolutely desert regions), and 

 they are generally so abundant and so conspicuous as to 

 occupy among birds the place assigned to butterflies among 

 insects. A few species range far into the temperate zones. 

 One reaches Carolina in North America, another the Magellan 

 Straits in South America ; in Africa they only extend a few 

 degrees beyond the southern tropic ; in North- Western India 

 they reach 35 north latitude, but in the Australian region 

 they range farthest towards the pole, being found not only in 

 New Zealand, but as far as the Macquarie islands in 54 

 south, where the climate is very cold and boisterous, but 

 sufficiently uniform to supply vegetable food throughout the 

 year. There is hardly any part of the equatorial zone in 

 which the traveller will not soon have his attention called to 

 some members of the parrot tribe. In Brazil the great blue 

 and yellow or crimson macaws may be seen every evening 

 wending their way homeward in pairs, almost as commonly 

 as rooks with us, while innumerable parrots and parraquets 

 attract attention by their harsh cries when disturbed from 

 some favourite fruit-tree. In the Moluccas and New Guinea 

 white cockatoos and gorgeous lories in crimson and blue are 

 the very commonest of birds. 



No group of birds perhaps no other group of animals 

 exhibits within the same limited number of genera and species 

 so wide a range and such an endless variety of colour. As a 

 rule, parrots may be termed green birds, the majority of the 

 species having this colour as the basis of their plumage 

 relieved by caps, gorgets, bands, and wing-spots of other and 

 brighter hues. Yet this general green tint sometimes changes 



