178 Walter Goodfellow—The Royal Parrot Finch


entirely of fig seeds, dry, and trodden quite liard. No nest contained

more tfian three young ones, and on two occasions only two, but in

both these under the litter was a clear egg pure white, so evidently

three is the complete clutch. When first hatched the bill is flesh colour.

This quickly turns to yellow and before they leave the nest it has

become orange. This looked strikingly beautiful against the dark

blue heads of the first plumage, but would probably not look so well

against the scarlet of the adult stage. The upper mandible quickly

changes to a dingy black, beginning at the tip and spreading upwards,

but the sides of the lower mandible remain more or less yellow for a

long time. The legs and feet at first flesh colour, gradually get darker,

and finally blackish. In all I reared seventeen young ones, but one

caught a chill after it could feed itself, through bathing late in the

evening during the hurricane when the temperature fell very low, and

died the next morning ; and another from the last nest of all jumped

from my hand on the verandah at Vila just as the sudden darkness

of the tropical night came on, and was lost under the house. The

remaining fifteen arrived here safely. They were among the most

delightful youngsters I have ever reared. They all had enormous

appetites, and it was really delightful to see a row of them all with

their orange bills wide open asking for food. At first the iridescent

nodules at the gape were bright blue, but quickly lost their brilliance as

the birds grew. On the palate were two crescent-shaped patches, black,

and very conspicuous when the mouths were open. Long after they

could feed themselves they still liked to be hand fed, and whenever

I opened the cage door they jumped out on my hand and arm with

beaks wide open. I reared them on a mixture of fig seeds (crushed at

first) with the yolk of hard boiled egg and biscuit meal which seemed to

suit them perfectly, and they were as easy to rear as any birds I have

ever had. At first the food was well moistened with water, but later

given fairly dry. When canary seed was supplied they took to it

at once.


In their first plumage they had the head and upper breast very dark

blue shaded into a much lighter greenish blue on the under parts, the

rump dark red and the tail brownish red, the back and wings dirty

green. At the time of writing (May) they are now five and four months



