402 



PARROT. 



mandible is brownish. The front is golden yellow, 

 extending upward to nearly the middle of the head. 

 From the gape, over the eyes, and down to the nape, 

 is bright green, which is also the general colour of 

 the body, both on the upper part and the under. The 

 chin, the lower parts of the cheeks, the throat, fore- 

 neck, and sides of the neck, are rich yellow, passing 

 gradually into a collar of dull red. A small portion 

 of the hind head and the outer margins of the quills 

 are blue. The tail differs from the tails of the others, 

 in the form and colouring of the feathers, as well as 

 in the general shape. The whole is green on the 

 upper part ; and the two middle feathers are very 

 stout and broad, and only two inches longer than the 

 rest ; whereas the Indian ones have those feathers 

 four inches longer, and the islander which we have 

 noticed has them at least six. The tail is also more 

 powerfully fortified by coverts, especially on the upper 

 side, than in the Indian ones, and more especially 

 than those of the isles, which have the base of the 

 tail but little fortified. 



There is no doubt that, if the manners of this para- 

 keet could be ascertained by observation, it would be 

 found that its structure agrees with the physical 

 character of its native country. We have, indeed, 

 remarkable instances of coincidences between country 

 and inhabitant, in the parakeets of the three localities. 

 The Oriental Archipelago is to a great extent a 

 perennial garden ; New Holland is for great part of 

 the year parched with drought, and it is' probable 

 that very large tracts of it are alternately stagnant 

 water and sun-baked mud, impregnated with salt, and 

 incapable of producing any vegetable : and India, 

 taking it in its general characters intermediate between 

 the two. Now, the parakeet of the isles is all for the 

 wing, and the tail is so feeble that it can serve little 

 purpose save that of a streamer ; the Australian one 

 has this organ vigorous, capable of spreading to a 

 considerable extent in the air, and fortified for acting 

 against the air with considerable effect ; and the 

 Indian one has an intermediate character. It is to 

 be regretted that there are no data for working out 

 in a satisfactory manner those relations between bird 

 and country ; because the birds, of tropical countries 

 especially, are so numerous and beautiful, that if we 

 could but apply them they would form a most de- 

 lightful index to the general natural history of those 

 countries. 



There still remain to be noticed a vast number 

 of parakeets, perhaps not fewer than sixty or seventy 

 species, well made out ; and this is a muster-roll 

 which no ordinary reader could be expected to get 

 through. These many writers characterise as the 

 true parakeets. Like the last-mentioned ones, they 

 have the cheeks completely feathered ; but their 

 tails are differently constructed. They are, gene- 

 rally speaking, long ; but the two middle feathers 

 are not greatly produced beyond the others, neither 

 do they differ from the others in their general 

 structure. The tails are, generally speaking, acutely 

 wedge-shaped ; but then, as we proceed from the 

 lateral feathers toward the central ones, the excess 

 in length of each feather beyond the one imme- 

 diately external of it is almost the same throughout 

 the whole. 



There is one circumstance which has tended to 

 render this sub-division of the parakeet so exceedingly 

 confused, that one can with extreme difficulty grope 

 one's way through it ; and that is the fact of having 



placed every member of the parrot family, with a 

 long wedge-shaped tail and feathers on the cheeks, 

 and being rather diminutive in size, within this sub- 

 division. Accordingly we have these parakeets in 

 all parts of the world, though probably many of them 

 ought to rank with some of the other sub-families, or 

 at all events to be formed into distinct genera or sub- 

 genera, in terms of their own specific organisation and 

 habits, and without reference to any gratuitous hypo- 

 theses, whether quinary, or anyj other more aber- 

 rant from common sense as possible. The characters 

 which we have mentioned, namely, the feathered 

 cheeks, and the long tail greatly but uniformly wedge- 

 shaped, are the only characters which apply to the whole 

 of these, and distinguish them from the others; and they 

 are but scanty foundations upon which to build any- 

 thing like a natural history of birds so exceedingly 

 numerous, and differing so much from each other in 

 various parts of their individual characters. There is 

 another disadvantage attending the matter, and that 

 is, our comparative ignorance of the habits of these 

 birds. From their structure we are led to conclude that 

 they art, generally speaking, eaters of fruit ; but in 

 what they differ from the rest of the family in this 

 respect, and in what particular part of the forest or of 

 the field they have their natural labour assigned to 

 them, we are perfectly ignorant. All that we can do 

 under such circumstances, therefore, is to mention 

 one or two of the species as specimens of the whole, 

 and, we shall take them from different countries, 

 remarking, in passing, that by far the greater number 

 of them appear to be natives of Australia, though they 

 Africa are also found in India, in the Oriental Island?, in 

 and its islands, in the tropical parts of the western 

 continent and also in its inter-tropical appendages. 



Bordered-wingParakeet (P. marginatus), is a native 

 of India. Its general plumage is green, with a blue 

 band on the top of the head, and blue on the fore part 

 of the body, the feathers externally bordered with 

 yellow. The wing-coverts next the body are blue 

 with yellow borders, the others are green marked with 

 yellow. The quills are brown, marked out with 

 borders of the same colour a good deal paler ; and 

 the tail-feathers are green above and yellow below. 

 The bill is red and the feet black. 



The species of those wedge-tailed parakeets occur- 

 ring in the south-eastern parts of Continental Asia are 

 few, compared with those which occur in the eastern 

 Archipelago, and these latter again are few as com- 

 pared with the Australian ones. Some of them in 

 both countries are very handsome birds. 



Flat-tailed Parakeet (P. platurus], is one of the 

 species of the Oriental Islands. It is greenish ash- 

 colour on the upper part, and brilliant green on the 

 head and neck, surmounted by a coronet of bluish 

 ash, with a large red spot in front of it, and it has a 

 half collar of orange on the neck. The lesser coverts 

 of the wings are grey, and quills green. The inter- 

 mediate feathers of the tail are green, and have a 

 portion of the shafts without barbs, and much longer 

 than the other feathers. The under part is yellowish 

 green, and the bill and feet brown. The length is 

 about eleven inches. 



Lichtenstc'nis Parakeet (P. Lichtensteinu), is an 

 Indian species of rather portly dimensions, being 

 seventeen inches in length. Its general plumage is 

 green, with the top of the head blue, and the hind part 

 of the neck and belly black. The flanks and tips of 

 the quills are yellow, the bill red, arid the feet black. 



