r 3 2 
PARROTS. 
ants’ eggs. Mr. Greene says that if several are kept in a cage, they will hang 
suspended side by side from the roof for hours at a time, in which position they 
will caress and feed one another. 
The Broadtail Group. 
Subfamily Platycercixa:. 
The last subfamily of the Psittacidce is represented by the broadtails, grass- 
parraquets, and their allies, and is entirely confined to Australia, New Zealand, 
ROSE HILL BROADTAIL (* Rat. size). 
New Caledonia, and the Society Islands. They are distinguished from all the 
preceding groups, with the exception of the parrotlets and love-birds, by the 
absence of the furcula; 1 while in the skull the ring round the eye is incomplete. 
The tail is rather long, graduated, and often pointed; and the beak of moderate 
size, and never red in colour. The cere is small, merely surrounding the nostrils : 
the beak short and thick, with the lower mandible generally concealed by the 
feathers of the cheeks; and the plumage much variegated. 
1 The single species of Naunodes is an exception in this respect, while it also differs from all other Psittacidoc 
in its brush-like tongue. 
