21(5 
BIRD OF PARADISE. 
None have ever reached this country in a living 
state, and hut one species, that we are aware of, has 
ever been kept in confinement. This was the great 
Paradise-bird, the flowing yellow plumage of whose 
THE GREAT BIRD OF PARADISE. 
tail is so much prized as an ornament for ladies’ 
head-dresses. It was in the possession of a gentle- 
man who had a valuable aviary of the rarest foreign 
birds, at Macao, in China. He kept it in a large 
cage, where it had abundance of room for the dis- 
play of its gaudy dress, of which it seemed very 
proud; dancing about when visiters approached, as 
if delighted at being made an object of admiration. 
It washed itself twice every day, and then threw up 
its delicate feathers nearly over its head. Nothing 
apjDeared to disturb it so much as any sort of dust 
attaching itself to its plumage. For at its toilet it 
pecked and cleaned all within reach, and throwing' 
out the elegant and delicate tuft of feathers under- 
