CAROLINA PARROT. 
387 
following’ appear to be the principal differences : The yellow 
on the neck of the female does not descend quite so far ; the 
interior vanes of the primaries are brownish, instead of black, 
and the orange red on the bend and edges of the wing is 
considerably narrower ; in other respects, the colours and 
markings are nearly the same. 
The young birds of the preceding year, of both sexes, are 
generally destitute of the yellow on the head and neck, until 
about the beginning or middle of March, having those parts 
wholly green, except the front and cheeks, which are orange 
red in them as in the full grown birds. Towards the middle 
of March the yellow begins to appear, in detached feathers, 
interspersed among the green, varying in different individuals. 
In some which I killed about the last of that month, only a 
few green feathers remained among the yellow; and these 
were fast assuming the yellow tint : for the colour changes 
without change of plumage. A number of these birds, in all 
their grades of progressive change from green to yellow, have 
been deposited in Mr Peale’s museum. 
What is called by Europeans the Illinois Parrot ( Psittacus 
pertinax ,) is evidently the young bird in its imperfect colours. 
Whether the present species be found as far south as Brazil, 
as these writers pretend, I am unable to say ; but from the 
great extent of country in which I have myself killed and 
examined these birds, I am satisfied that the present species, 
now described, is the only one inhabiting the United States. 
Since the foregoing was written, I have had an opportunity, 
by the death of a tame Carolina Paroquet, to ascertain the 
fact of the poisonous effects of their head and intestines on 
cats. Having shut up a cat and her two kittens, (the latter 
only a few days old,) in a room with the head, neck, and 
whole intestines of the Paroquet, I found, on the next morning, 
the whole eaten except a small part of the bill. The cat 
exhibited no symptom of sickness ; and, at this moment, three 
days after the experiment has been made, she and her kittens 
