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®yacinthine HJacaw. 
Psittacus hyacinthinus, Russ. 
Synonyms: Am hyacinthma, Gr., Schlgl.; Psittacus Augustus, Shw.; 
Psittacara cobaltina, Brj.; Macrocercus Augustus, Stph.; 
Macrocercus hyacinthinus, Lss.; Anodorliyncus Maximiliani, Spx.; 
Am hyacinthinus, Fnsch.; Sittace hyacinthinus, Wgl. 
German : Dor hyazinthblaue Arara. 
HIS is a very rare bird, possessed by a few Zoological Gardens 
JL only; its general colour is deep blue, and it is, as Dr. Russ 
remarks, distinguished by a particularly colossal beak {m/it besonders 
kolossalem Schnabel). 
A very fine specimen has survived for a considerable time in the 
Gardens of the London Zoological Society, where it has learned to 
repeat a few words, and is especially partial to the youthful visitors, 
who, with no lavish hand, share their buns and cakes with it, as it 
screams and swings just above their heads on the perch to which it 
is chained under the trees, by the Parrot-house, facing the Regent’s 
Canal. 
The usual diet is maize, hemp, monkey-nuts, to which may be added 
biscuits, nuts of all kinds, apples and fruit; it is one of the few 
Parrots in the “ Zoo ” that is permitted to drink, and certainly appears 
to thrive on the regimen provided for it. 
We do not admire any of the Macaws, and would not be tempted 
to keep one of them for a good deal ; still we cannot quite agree 
with Mr. Wiener that “ their huge size, brilliant feathers, and loud 
screams are a very good advertisement for a travelling menagerie, to 
whom amateurs had better abandon these birds, unless some one would 
care to construct a wrought-iron in-door aviary (I doubt whether bricks 
and mortar would be proof against their beaks) to make an attempt 
at breeding.” 
