86 PRETTY POLL. 



green is the right hue for concealment or defence. 

 Therefore the parrots, the most purely tropical family of 

 birds on earth, are mostly greenish ; and among the 

 smaller and more defenceless sorts, like the familiar 

 little love-birds, where the need for protection is greatest, 

 the green of the plumage is almost unbroken. Of the 

 tiny Pigmy Parrots of New Guinea, for instance, Mr. 

 Bowdler Sharpe says : ' Owing to their small size and 

 the resemblance of their green colouring to the forests 

 they inhabit, they are not easily seen, and until recent 

 years were very hard to procure.' And of the green 

 parrot of Jamaica, Mr. Gosse remarks : ' Often we hear 

 their voices proceeding from a certain tree, or else have 

 marked the descent of a flock on it ; but on proceeding 

 to the spot, though the eye has not wandered from it, 

 we cannot discover an individual. We go close to the 

 tree, but all is silent and still as death. We institute 

 a careful survey of every part with the eye, to detect the 

 slightest motion, or the form of a bird among the leaves, 

 but all in vain. We begin to think they have stolen off 

 unperceived ; but on throwing a stone into the tree, a 

 dozen throats burst forth into a cry, and as many green 

 birds rush forth upon the wing,' Green may thus be 

 regarded as the normal or basal parrot tint, from which 

 all other colours are special decorative variations. 



But fruit-eating and flower-feeding creatures, like 

 butterflies and humming-birds seeking their food ever 

 among the bright berries and brilliant flowers, almost 

 invariably acquire in the long run an aesthetic taste for 

 pure and varied colouring, and by the aid of sexual 

 selection this taste stereotypes itself at last in their 



