BLUE MOUNTAIN LOBT. 
43 
or they would veiy soon, as the dealers perfectly well know, soon have 
no Lories to keep. 
Yet Blue Mountain Lories are unsatisfactory birds on the whole, for 
such as care about a little extra trouble, that is to say; but they are 
very beautiful, if not gifted with sweet voices; and though cruel to 
their captive companions, are amiable enough with their master or 
mistress, and not at all deserving of unconditional disapproval. In the 
country they readily learn to fly out and return at the word of com- 
mand, and a little liberty when the lime trees are in blossom, or the 
gorse gilds the common with its myriad blooms, will enable the Blue 
Mountain to lay in a stock of health and vigour that will stand him 
in good stead for many days. 
Mignonette in flower, groundsel-tops, dandelion blooms, cabbage 
blossoms, will be appreciated and gratefully received; hawthorn, too, 
apple and pear blossoms, if the latter can be spared, wallflowers, and, 
generally, such flowers as contain honey, especially clover, are good 
for these birds: but beware of tho golden panicles of the laburnum, 
for they contain a deadly poison, as do the seeds, bark, roots, and 
even the loaves of that beautiful and most graceful tree. 
No one can keep a Blue Mountain with the amount of care and 
attention sufficient to preserve a White Cockatoo in the rudest of health; 
but it is a libel on a beautiful bird to say that he cannot be kept at 
all — he can: try it, O reader! follow the plan we have recommended, 
and you will have your reward. 
Hon. and Rev. F. G. Dutton' s account of the 
Bhte Mountain Lory. 
This bird may divide the palm of beauty with the Beautiful Para- 
keet ( Psephotus jmlcherrimus J amongst the Australian Parrots, and 
would be a charming pet, but for its noisiness and its dirty habits. 
But before I take away its character in this latter respect, I ought 
to add that I have never kept a pair trained to eat seed. I fed mine, 
as I fed my Purple-capped Lories, on dried figs soaked in hot water 
till they could be mashed into a pulp, mixed with soaked bun, and the 
whole made rather moist. I find the Lory tribe thrive on this food, 
but then it makes their droppings constant, fluid and very ofi^ensive. 
I am bound to say that a well-known dealer has shown me these birds 
living on canary-seed, whose plumage looked the picture of health, and 
whose cages were, for Parrots, very clean; yet I observed that even 
he did not venture to feed his Ceram, and Purple-capped Lories on 
