TALKING-BIRDS. 
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TALKING-BIRDS. 
Foremost among Talking-birds are the Parrots—a most numerous, splen¬ 
did, and highly characteristic family of birds, subdivided into several 
groups, chiefly according to the form of the bill and tail; as the macaws, 
cockatoos, lories, paroquets, &c. The greater part are tree-birds, belong¬ 
ing to the order of climbers. The foot of the true parrot is a grasping 
rather than a walking one, and partakes more of the nature of a hand than 
of a foot. They all unite great beauty with great docility, and their facility 
m imitating the human voice is greater than that of any other bird. 
Parrots inhabit principally the luxuriant tracts of the torrid zone, but are 
not exclusively confined to it, and are found in latitudes as far as forty or 
fifty degrees north and south of the equator. They are almost exclusively 
vegetable feeders, and the kernels of fruit and the buds and flowers of 
trees are their principal food. 
In the natural state, many of them are social birds, often issuing from the 
trees in large flocks, and laying the cultivated fields under severe contribu¬ 
tions. Social birds are almost always capable of being tamed, nearly in the 
same ratio as they are sociable ; and this is particularly true with regard to 
parrots, who may be trained to do almost any thing; and they show great 
attachment to those who feed them and are kind to them. They also suf¬ 
fer less from confinement than most other birds, because their habit of climb¬ 
ing enables them to take a great deal of exercise in a small space. They 
are long-lived birds, and some have been known to attain the age of eighty 
years. Both cock and hen birds are equally gifted with the power of 
speech. As regards beauty, however, the cocks claim the advantage. 
