150 
IN SESSORES. 
growth of timber, and an underwood of canes and 
other evergreens ; while the descent into these slug- 
gish streams is often ten or fifteen feet perpendicu- 
lar, into a bed of deep clay. In some of the worst 
of these places, where I had, as it were, to fight my 
way through, the Paraquet frequently escaped from 
my pocket, obliging me to dismount and pursue it 
through the worst of the morass before I could re- 
gain it. On these occasions I was several times 
tempted to abandon it; but I persisted in bringing it 
along. When at night I encamped in the woods, I 
placed it on the baggage beside me, where it usually 
sat with great composure, dozing and gazing at the 
fire till morning. In this manner I carried it up- 
wards of a thousand miles in my pocket, where it 
was exposed all day to the jolting of the horse, but 
regularly liberated at meal times, and in the evening, 
at which it always expressed great satisfaction. In 
passing through the Chickasaw and Choctaw nations, 
the Indians, wherever I stopped to feed, collected 
around me, men, women, and children, laughing and 
seeming wonderfully amused with the novelty of my 
companion. The Chickasaws called it in their lan- 
guage ‘ Mlinky but when they heard me call it 
Poll, they soon repeated the name ; and wherever I 
chanced to stop among these people, we soon became 
familiar with each other through the medium of Poll. 
On arriving at Mr. Dunbar’s, below Natchez, I pro- 
cured a cage and placed it under the piazza, where, 
by its call, it soon attracted the passing flocks ; such 
is the attachment they have for each other. Numer- 
