144 
Pals. 
Another Hybrid : I have a cock Migratory Tlirush 
(Titrdus migratoriiis) mated up with a Song Thrush (T . nms- 
icus), which liave nested, laid, and are either incubating eggs 
about due to hatch or feeding young. Has this cross been 
reared before ? 
Red-rump Parrakeets {I'scf^lwliis Jiacniatoiotus). Their 
first nest was a failure, but they promptly nested again, and their 
second clutch must be about due to hatch out. 
There may be others, but the above are all of which I am 
cognisant at present. 
0 
Pals. 
By Wesley T. Page. F.Z.S., M.B.O.U. . 
The more I see, and the more closely I observe living 
creatures, from lordly man himself down to the lowest phase 
of animal life, the more I am convinced that the spirit of palship 
is prevalent with every species — not a palship that is general, 
but an individual one, and by no means confined to unmated 
birds, nor does the breeding season entirely separate the pals, 
though the duties of reproducing their kind and feeding a family 
materially curtails the time available for the enjoyment of such 
palship — neither does it in anyway interfere with Nature's stern 
law of " the survival of the fittest," yet this " piffle " is of a 
palship that is as real as any that exists between individuals of 
genus Homo. 'J'here is, however, some difference — I had 
better interpolate here that my observation leads me to draw a 
sharp line between cross-mating, courtship and " palship " and 
between the human and animal world iialshij) (of course in this 
philandering I confine myself to aviary-life); it is usually quite 
outside the domestic life of respective pairs ; is usually between 
members of the same sex (platonic friendship is almost unknown 
in aviary-life, and may be taken, when it does occur, as the ex- 
ception which proves the rule), and Mr. Zebra Finch or Mr. 
Cutthroat do not introduce their pals to their respective mates, 
so, in the avian world Mr. Cutthroat is not called upon to 
eulogise, truly or falsely, the beauty and sweetness of Mr. 
