GREAT WHITE-GBE8TEE COCKATOO. 
9 
of the trees in their native land. In England they are usually kept 
chained by one leg to a perch fixed at right angles to an upright stand 
of three or four feet in height. Stand and cross-bar should be made 
of the hardest obtainable wood, and the ends of the perch should be 
cased in tin or zinc; but perches made of metal are apt to give the 
birds cramp, and even to produce inflammation of the lungs and bowels, 
by chilling the poor creatures when the weather is cold; and we all 
know what a distressing sensation is produced throughout the entire 
system, when we sit shivering with cold feet, on some ungenial winter^ s 
day, while waiting for a train perchance, or for the promised arrival 
of a friend who fails to keep his appointment. 
The Great White Cockatoo is very easily tamed, if taken young from 
the nest, and brought up by hand, or rather by mouth, for the proper 
way to bring up young Parrots or Cockatoos who have lost, or been 
taken from, their parents, is to boil some maize and oats until they 
are quite soft, chew them to small pieces in the mouth, and let the 
young things feed themselves there as they do when they trust their 
beaks into their father’s bill. A bird thus reared will become perfectly 
tame and confiding, and, especially if his owner lives in the country, 
may be trusted with entire liberty out of doors, even to accompanying 
his master, or mistress, on a long walk, or ride; with children, how- 
ever, they are nearly always spiteful and not to be trusted, and of dogs 
they have an utter abhorrence, which they take every opportunity of 
displaying. 
A bird of this species that belonged to a lady friend of ours, was 
so tame that he was suffered to go about the place at his own sweet 
will, and delighted in sitting on a paling some three or four feet away 
from the utmost range of the chained house-dog, whom “Cocky” took 
a malicious pleasure m driving almost to madness, which from his 
great proficiency in the canine tongue, he could do without the least 
difficulty whenever he liked, and in which, judging from the effect 
produced upon his enemy, he was in the habit of making anything but 
complimentary remarks upon the latter, and possibly his relatives and 
friends. This bird, too, used apparently to take the greatest delight in 
swooping down upon Ponto, and passing over his back, at a sufficient 
distance to escape his jaws and claws, but yet near enough to flap him 
on the nose with his powerful pinions: but the pitcher may go to the 
well too often, and Master Cocky one day dared the house-dog for the 
last time. 
Whether he swooped down lower, or more slowly than usual, or 
whether the dog exerted more strength and leaped higher and with 
greater impetus, who shall say? the bird was caught in Ponto’s jaws. 
