PARROTS. 27 



Le Vaillant tells us that in south-eastern Africa the native parrots fly in little flocks in search of 

 food, bathe about noon, and hide themselves among the foliage during the overpowering heat of the 

 sun. Towards evening they disperse themselves, after which they again bathe, and then fly back to 

 the same roosting-place from which they had departed in the morning. These roosting-places are 

 very various — sometimes the thickly-leaved top of a tree, sometimes a rock full of holes, often a 

 hollow tree trunk ; the situation last mentioned seems to be especially sought after. " Their 

 sleeping-place," says Audubon, speaking of the American parrakeets, " is a hollow tree, or the hole 

 chiselled out in some tree's trunk, to be the nestling-place of the larger woodpeckers, that is, in case 

 these are not occupied by their true owners. In the gloaming large flocks of parrots assemble around 

 old hollow sycamores, or other trees of similar character ; and may be seen immediately in front 

 of the entrance clinging to the bark, until one after another they disappear through the hole that 

 leads into the interior, in order to pass the night. When a hollow of this description is not 

 sufficiently large to accommodate the numbers that are assembled, those that come last are content 

 to suspend themselves by their bill and claws from the bark before the entrance. 



We have ourselves, in the primitive forests around the Blue River, in Africa, repeatedly watched 

 the parrots at twilight, slipping one after another into their hole, and have observed them ranged with 

 great regularity around the many perforations in the trunk of some old Adansonia. 



In India, the Collared Parrot, as Layard informs us, sleeps among the thickets of bamboos. " All 

 Parrots, Bee-eaters, Grakles, and Crows from districts extending for many miles around, pass the 

 night in flocks among the great bamboo plantations, where the dull rushing sound caused by their 

 flutterings, constantly heard from sundown till dark, and from the first grey dawning in the east until 

 long after sunrise, might almost be supposed by the observer to proceed from numerous steam-engines 

 in full work. Many of these flocks returning late in the evening from their excursions, fly so near 

 to the ground that they scarcely clear the obstacles to their course ; indeed, they do not always 

 succeed in doing so ; for, several nights together, we have picked up parrots which had flown against 

 walls or similar obstructions, and had been killed in consequence." 



Layard gives a very lively account of the behaviour and doings of the Alexander parrot (a 

 species commonly met with in Ceylon), at one of their sleeping-places. 



In Chilau, he relates, that he has seen such massive flights of these birds winging their way to 

 their roosting-places among the cocoa-nut trees that overshadow the market-place, that their cries 

 completely drowned the Babel-like confusion of tongues heard among the buyers and sellers in the 

 streets. He had previously been told of the flocks which thus pay their nightly visits, and placed 

 himself, accordingly, towards evening, upon one of the neighbouring bridges, in order to form a 

 calculation of the numbers that might make their appearance in a certain given direction. At about 

 four o'clock in the afternoon they began to arrive ; scattered swarms were seen wending their way 

 homewards, to these there succeeded others still more numerous, and in the course of half an hour 

 the homeward stream was apparently in full flow. He very soon found that it was impossible even 

 to count the flocks, which seemed gradually to unite into one great living, roaring torrent. Some 

 flew high in the air, until they were immediately over their roosting-place, and then suddenly plunged 

 down, wheeling round and round towards the tree-tops, of which they were in search. Others 

 crowded onwards, flying close to the ground — indeed, so closely that some of them nearly grazed his 

 face. They swept along with the rapidity of thought, and their dazzling plumage seemed to be lit up 

 with' gorgeous brilliancy, as it glanced in the rays of the sun. He waited at his post of observation 

 until the evening closed in, and he could see no longer, but even then the flight of the birds as they 

 made towards their nests was audible. When he fired oft" a gun, they rose with a sound like that of 

 a furiously rushing wind ; soon, however, they again settled down, and commenced an indescribable 



