JAMAICA PARROT. 97 



various West Indian Islands, who are not as fastidious in many respects 

 as we are. 



Though undoubtedly mischievous, it seems a pity that these interesting 

 birds should be sooner or later doomed to extinction; for whether 

 clambering among the dark green foliage of the orange trees, clinging 

 to the purple or yellow bunches of bananas, or making a reconnoisance 

 among the crops of maize, they add materially to the animation as 

 well as to the beauty and picturesqueness of the scene they grace 

 with their presence ; but it is doubtful, to say the least, whether their 

 various good points are appreciated by the owners of the several crops 

 mentioned; and possibly were we in a position to change places with 

 the owners in question (which a kind Heaven forfend !), we should 

 be of their way of thinking; for we feel vexed with our own saucy 

 sparrows, when we find a mob of them devastating a bed of crocuses 

 or of primroses; or busily engaged in scratching up the seed which 

 the gardener has just planted on the lawn. 



It is a case of every one for himself, we are afraid, in which the 

 weakest must go to the wall sooner or later. The Dodo has disappeared, 

 also the Great Auk, not to speak of the Dinornis and the Moa. The 

 Phillip Island Parrot is also probably extinct, while the Curious-toothed 

 Pigeon (C. strigirostris) , the Great Ground Parrot of New Zealand, 

 and many others have either passed, or are on the point of passing 

 away from the familiar scenes they once haunted in peace and security ; 

 and which, in a few short years at the latest, will know them again 

 no more for ever. Yet the world jogs on in its accustomed path, and 

 no one, except a few old fogies, will even give vent to a sigh of 

 regret for the irrecoverable loss of a whole race of fellow-creatures; 

 which no doubt once had a role to fulfil, and having fulfilled it, were 

 bound to disappear from the stage of existence, and make room for 

 others, that doubtless will in the course of time be fain to follow in 

 their footsteps. 



Be that as it may, it is probably hopeless to expect that legislative 

 enactments will at least postpone the extinction of some of the threatened 

 races in this and the other hemisphere ; for vested interests take little 

 note of legal restrictions that are not enforced by heavier penalties 

 than obtain, say in the case of our Wild Bird Protection Acts, at which 

 our professional bird-catchers simply snap their fingers and laugh; 

 spreading their nets in defiance of the law, and taking birds by the 

 thousand, we might indeed say by the million, from the 1st. of January 

 to the 31st. of December. What is every person's business is usually 

 nobody's, and so the slaughter (for to trap the poor creatures in the 

 summer-time is tantamount to killing them) goes on; and fanciers 



