120 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA. 



which sweep its home that it never takes wing ; 

 and it is only high up on the New Zealand 

 Alps that the great sheep-killing Kea {Nestor notabilis), 

 which looks as much like a buzzard as a Parrot, 

 makes its horrible meals off living sheep. It would 

 seem therefore that Parrots can live almost anywhere 

 ^nd anyhow, given ground habitable by land-birds at 

 all ; and this makes it the more curious that in those 

 most richly varied collections of animal life, the 

 African and Indian faunas, the Parrots make no very 

 great show. We have here no gorgeous lories or 

 macaws, no snowy and crested cockatoos — hardly 

 anything, in fact, but the long-tailed green parrakeets, 

 ■of which our common Ring-necked species (Paloeornis 

 torquatus), is far the most abundant, and extends 

 all over India, spreading East to Cochin China. It 

 •does not ascend the hills as a rule, and it likes culti- 

 vated ground, where it has the opportunity of using 

 holes in buildings, as well as in trees, for nesting 

 purposes, paying for the accommodation afforded 

 by constituting itself an economic pest of the first 

 water by its greedy and wasteful assaults on grain 

 and fruit. It must be admitted, however, as an 

 extenuating circumstance, that " poor Polly's" 

 popularity as a cage-bird outweighs a good deal of 

 ■damage done, for a good many rupees must be turned 

 over annually by those who deal in Parrots. 



