228 HISTORY OF 



This sagacity which parrots shew in a domestic 

 state, seems also natural to them in their native 

 residence among the woods. They live together 

 in flocks, and mutually assist each other against 

 other animals, either by their courage or their 

 notes of warning. They generally breed in hol- 

 low trees, where they make a round hole, and do 

 not line their nests within. If they find any part 

 of a tree beginning to rot from the breaking off 

 of a branch, or any such accident, this they take 

 care to scoop, and to make the hole sufficiently 

 wide and convenient ; but it sometimes happens 

 that they are content with the hole which a wood- 

 pecker has wrought out with greater ease before 

 them j and in this they prepare to hatch and 

 bring up their young. 



They lay two or three eggs ; and probably the 

 smaller kind may lay more ; for it is a rule that 

 universally holds through nature, that the small- 

 est animals are always the most prolific ; for be- 

 ing, from their natural weakness, more subject to 

 devastation, nature finds it necessary to replenish 

 the species by superior fecundity. In general, 

 however, the number of their eggs is stinted to 

 two, like those of the pigeon, and they are about 

 the same size. They are always marked with 

 little specks, like those of a partridge ; and some 

 travellers assure us, that they are always found in- 

 die trunks of the tallest, straightest, and the larg- 

 est trees. The natives of these countries, who 

 have little else to do, are very assiduous in spying 

 out the places where the parrot is seen to nestle, 

 and generally come with great joy to inform the 



