100 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA. 



crawling movements seem so excellently suited for a 

 captive's narrow bounds. 



But a wild Parrot shows one thab half the bird's time is 

 passed in its swift graceful flight a flight, by the way, 

 that is strikingly different from that of most land birds, the 

 downward-pointed wings, with their sharp decisive 

 stroke, at once recalling some plover, sandpiper or other 

 shore -haunting fowl. Like these aquatics, also, Polly 

 carries her feet stowed astern and not tucked up to the 

 breast, though it took me a long time to find this out when 

 I was investigating this point, with a view to discovering 

 the reason for this difference in habit in birds for some 

 kinds carry their feet forward and others behind in the 

 most inexplicable way. But one day a Parrot, urged 

 perhaps by a desire to examine its defunct relatives, came 

 into the Bird gallery of the museum, and, as it careered to 

 and fro overhead, it gave me an opportunity of seeing how 

 the feet were placed. Ordinarily they seem to be buried 

 in the under-tail-coverts when the bird is on the wing, 

 but this individual was too flurried to put this final touch 

 to its flying attitude. As to the reason, I have not found 

 that out yet ; all birds belonging to a given natural family 

 seem to stow their feet in the same way, so that it is pro- 

 bably only a meaningless inherited habit. 



Parrots are chiefly winter birds with us in Calcutta, but 

 they must breed not far off, for some of the infants brought 

 into the Provision Bazaar are very young indeed, and 

 hardly fit to stand a "long journey. Nasty little things 

 they are, some as naked as the palm of one's hand, and 

 of much the same colour. Few. however, are quite nude, 



