278



Countess of Essex — Polly—-My Amazon



the next second she made her beak meet through my finger Polly

has not been offered many “ helping hands ” since !


During the summer Polly is loose in the garden for many hours,

generally remaining in some fruit trees near the house. If anything

startles her she flies round for a bit. One terrible day she flew to the

tops of the tallest elms and seemed to be too nervous to come down

again. She never went off the place, but remained out for four days

in spite of my frantic efforts to attract her down. She answered all

my calls and sometimes flew round and round in circles high above

my head, but still lacked the nerve to descend. It was heart-breaking

to see her little yellow face peering down, anxiously wondering why

I did not fetch her home. At long last she did come down to a smaller

tree, and by climbing we got her. Then her joy was intense—she sang,

kissed me, and was almost too excited to eat. During the time she

was out she could have eaten nothing but the tree leaves, etc., and

through glasses I watched her licking dew off the leaves as, of course,

she had no water. However, it taught her a lesson. Now if she flies

off for a few hours she comes down at the front door and shrieks until

she is fetched in.


She is extremely jealous of me : she will shriek and scream if I pick

up a puppy, etc., and if I do not leave it and go to her, she will fly

across all ready for an attack. Strangers she hates and will shriek

and rave until I take her on my shoulder—then she will settle down

quietly. In fact I am her only lover, and she is very faithful. (Secretly

I feel very proud of being the only person in the household who can

handle Polly !) I can do anything I like with her : tickle her, roll

her on her back, pick her up anyhow —nothing annoys her if / do it.


When I first owned Polly I was worried about her health and generally

disreputable appearance, so I wrote to Lord Tavistock and asked his

advice. He very kindly wrote me a most helpful letter, and cheered

me enormously by saying healthy Parrots were nearly always jealous,

in fact jealousy was an excellent sign, so I felt my Polly had a very good

chance of surviving. Her stable food is a mixture of canary, hemp,

millet with a dash of Spratt’s Parrot food in it. Pea-nuts are always

with her, she does not much care for any others. Her favourite fruits

vary ; at the moment cherries are first favourites, but grapes are always



