PHILOSOPHY OF LOVE 



splendour. The female must content herself with burnt 

 sienna back-covering which comes down onto her ochre- 

 coloured belly. 



A little head projecting from an enormous neck-circle 

 of white out-puffing feathers, middle sized body, and 

 long legs. It is the combatant (ruff -bird). One must 

 add a tapering beak, ornamented at the base by a sort 

 of red grape. One can't say what colour the male is, he 

 is of all colours. One leaves him white, and finds him 

 red; he was black, and is violet; later he will be speckled 

 or banded in most varied hues. His ruff is an ornament 

 and a defence; he loses both it and his red grape with the 

 passing of his fighting and loving season. This instabil- 

 ity of feathering accords curiously with the instability of 

 his character; no animal is more irritable or cantanker- 

 ous. One can not keep him captive save solitary and in 

 obscurity. The female, somewhat less turbulent never 

 changes her vestment, an invariable gray, with a small 

 amount of brown on the back. 



Peacocks and turkey-cocks alone can spread wheel- 

 wise their fan-tails, as also the cock bustard; they alone 

 are provided with great wattles. The menure hen lifts, 

 as the cock, a lyre of feathers, but it is a tarnished and 

 mediocre imitation of her master's, which glistens in 

 all shades rising and curving with such paradoxical grace. 



The dimorphism of birds of paradise is even more 

 marked than in the preceding cases. Nape citron-yellow, 

 throat green, forehead black, back in burnt chestnut, 

 the cock's tail has two long plumes, his flanks two fine 

 tapering feathers of yellow-orange marked in red, which 

 he can spread branching or draw in at will; the dim 

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