18 BOMBAY DUCKS 
mon form, which haunts most of our compounds in 
India, is known to men of science as the rose-ringed 
paroquet, or Palgornis torquatus. The grass-green 
plumage of this species must be familiar to every one in 
England, for the bird is on sale in every fancier’s shop. 
The two sexes do not wear exactly similar plumage. 
The male has a rose-coloured collar and a black neck- 
tie, while his wife has, by way of a collar, to put up 
with an emerald-green ring round her neck, and, being 
a mere woman, is obliged to go through life without the 
luxury of a necktie. 
If there be anything in phrenology, the green parrot 
must have the bump of destructiveness very largely 
developed. The bird is never so happy as when it is 
destroying the crop sown by some poor vazyat; and, since 
parrots are restrained by neither law nor a moral sense, 
there is no hindrance to their self-indulgence, except the 
small boys who are told off to watch the crops; but 
these urchins only serve to add zest to parrot existence. 
Polly’s larcenies would lose half their charm had 
not the thief the pleasure of dodging the ill-aimed 
stones of the small watchmen. The methods of green 
parrots are copied from those of Indian jungle folk, or 
perhaps the converse is the case. Of this each man 
must judge for himself. It is for me but to state the 
sober fact that if an unsophisticated villager desires the 
wherewithal to build him a house, and if the aforesaid 
villager lives in the neighbourhopd of a “reserved 
forest,” he forthwith betakes Heshae the said forest 
and proceeds to cut down the twelve most promising 
saplings upon which he can lay his axe. 
