on Recollections of some Bird Friends. 67


end against one side of the cage, which I then covered with a

light woollen shawl. At those times, and then only, the Rosella

used to utter piercing shrieks of anger and derision, and I

should not have mentioned the plan, but that I have since found

it a most useful one in treating delicate Gouldians or such birds

as really require warmth on cold winter nights, or even on damp

summer ones when the birds are moulting badly, or when egg¬

binding is feared.


Two Rosellas in succession died of fits and apoplexy,

brought on, I believe, by constipation and want of exercise. My

third bird was tame and used to fly about my room, and he ate

apples and mealworms, which I cannot help thinking was

a very helpful change from a diet of dry seed only. He lived

with me for several years, and then I gave him to a great

admirer of his who had done me the service of taking care

of a favourite dog while I was abroad. Last spring I heard

that the bird was as well and as lively as ever, and I trust he is

so still. In my opinion the common Red Rosella is one of the

most beautiful as well as one of the most amiable of Parra-

keets. It very seldom screams or makes any disagreeable noise

whatever.


My next foreign bird was an American Nonpareil—but if

I begin to enlarge upon his beauties and graces and excellences

of all sorts I shall never stop. I consider him a perfect cage

bird. My original one is still living (it is six years or more since

I bought him) though he quickly passed out of my possession

into my mother’s. When I went for my annual holiday in

Switzerland I took my Rosella and my Nonpareil with me, as in

their case I could not adopt my old plan of setting free. They

were much admired, but, owing to a multiplicity of cats (there

were 25 cats and kittens in and about the house at the time) I

kept my birds strictly in my own room. One morning I heard

my mother ask my father to smoke in her glass house, as the

plants were covered with green fly. I wanted my father to walk

with me, so I proposed my Nonpareil as his substitute in the

greenhouse. At first my mother was afraid, “ Would not the

bird hurt the flowers? Might he not poison himself?” I

thought not; and he was soon flying loose among the plants, and

was pronounced by my mother to be a far more effectual vermin-



