RED HEADED GUINEA PARRAKEET. 
PsiTTACUS PUTTAKCUS. 
Le petite Perruche de Guinea. 
Le Perruche a tete rouge ou le 
Moineau de Guinea. 
Little red-headed Parrakeet, or 
Guinea Sparrow. 
Red-headed Parrakeet. 
Lin . Syst. i. ft. 149. 
Bns. Orn. iv. ft. 3 87 . 
Buff. Ois. vi. ft. 165. 
Edw. 23 7. 
Lath. Gen. Sjm. i. ft. 309 . 
This small species is about the size of a Lark, and is five inches and a half 
long. It is dispersed over almost all the southern climates, for it is found 
in Ethiopia, India, Java, and is also met with at Surinam. These birds 
are very common in Guinea, and are frequently exported from Africa in 
great numbers to Europe, although not above one in ten survives the pas- 
sage. Those, however, who escape this first danger, often live many years 
in these latitudes, after their arrival. 
They are more admired for the brilliancy of their plumage, their tame- 
ness, and docility, than for any thing else ; for though they can, in a cer- 
tain degree, imitate the manners of other birds, they do not talk, and their 
note, or rather their sorcam, is very harsh and discordant. 
1 hey are remarkable for their affection for each other, and seem wretched 
in case of a minute s separation. If one of a pair is sick, the other imme- 
diately becomes melancholy ; and should the one die, its associate ishardly 
ever known to survive. 
The female differs from the male in the circumstance of having less vivid 
colours, tiie led is much paler, and inclines to orange, and the ridge of 
the wing is yellow, which in the male is blue. 
