<h2><SPAN name="THE_PAROQUET" id="THE_PAROQUET"></SPAN>THE PAROQUET.</h2>
<div>
<ANTIMG class="drop-cap" src="images/initial_i_alt.jpg" width-obs="35" height-obs="70" alt="" /></div>
<p class="drop-cap">"I AM SO SORRY," wrote a little
girl from Tarrytown, N. Y., to the
editor of <span class="sc">Birds and all Nature</span>,
"not to find in your magazine any
more the bird-talks to the little folks.
I used to read them with so much interest.
Are there to be no more of
them?"</p>
<p>Other little folks have written to the
editor in much the same strain, so that
this month the paroquet will speak for
himself.</p>
<p>"From my photograph," he says;
"you will notice that I am fond of gay
dress, green, blue, yellow, orange-chrome,
and red being my favorite colors.
From my brilliant coat you would
judge me to be a tropical bird, but I'm
not. I was born and raised in the
United States, as was my family, therefore
I am an American citizen.</p>
<p>"In appearance I greatly resemble my
cousin, the glib-tongued parrot, but for
some reason, though my tongue is thick
and short like his, and my bill as
charmingly curved, I cannot talk—that
is, not to be understood by the human
family, I mean, for among ourselves we
keep up a very lively conversation, in
very loud tones—a mark we think, as do
some other folk, of good breeding. On
the other hand there are people unreasonable
enough not to like it, and
they say we 'scream' and that our notes
are 'ear-splitting' and that, though we
are beautiful to look upon and extremely
docile, our voices render us
undesirable as cage birds or pets.
The idea! As though we do not consider
that very fortunate!—for a cage is
a prison, no matter if the bars are gilded.
For my part I prefer to be free even if
I do have to hustle for a living and, between
you and me, I think that a bird
that can screech and doesn't screech
when shut up in a little cage doesn't deserve
to live. He ought to be killed and
stuffed and set up in a museum for people
to gape at. Don't you think so, too?</p>
<p>"It is a great pity, but we paroquets
are fast being exterminated. In some
regions, where less than twenty-five
years ago we were very plentiful, not a
paroquet is now to be seen. We were
once quite common in Ohio, Indiana,
Illinois, Pennsylvania, and other parts
of the United States. We are now to
be found, in diminished numbers,
in remote localities only of the lower
Mississippi Valley and the Gulf States
and in some regions of Florida. To
escape from our enemy, the plume-hunter,
we make our homes in practically
uninhabitable regions. That is a
long word for you little folks, but spell
it out slowly, as I did, and you will understand
what it means.</p>
<p>"Our nesting-time is during February
and March. Then colonies of us paroquets,
sometimes numbering a thousand,
flock to a cypress swamp and
build our flimsy nests in forks of trees,
near the end of a slender, horizontal
branch. Often there are fifty nests in
one small tree, each containing from
four to five pretty, greenish-white eggs.
It is a good thing we build our nests in
wild and unsettled places, for they are
so flimsy that the eggs are plainly visible
from beneath. What a temptation
to the bad boy they would be, and to
the bad man, also! Some paroquets,
however, choose a hollow tree in which
to deposit their eggs.</p>
<p>"Well, I have told you about all I
know of myself and family, so will close
by reciting in my very loudest and
prettiest screech, so that all the neighborhood
may hear, a few lines about a
Mr. Macaw who was silly enough, after
escaping from a cage, to return to it.
He is a cousin of mine, a <i>distant</i> cousin,
for he was born in South America; but
he wears the same colored coat and
vest as I do, his tongue is just as thick,
and his bill curves like a parrot's, also:</p>
<p class="ac">MR. MACAW'S LESSON.</p>
<div class="poetry-container">
<div class="poetry">
<div class="stanza">
<div class="verse">'Mr. Macaw was tired of his cage—</div>
<div class="verse indent-2">Too much of a prison for home;</div>
<div class="verse">Mr. Macaw was in a great rage,</div>
<div class="verse indent-2">And so he <i>settled</i> to roam.</div>
</div>
<div class="stanza">
<div class="verse">The cage-door was open, the window too</div>
<div class="verse indent-2">(Strange chance, both open together!),</div>
<div class="verse">So he took his chance and away he flew;</div>
<div class="verse indent-2">But, alas! it was wintry weather.</div>
</div>
<div class="stanza">
<div class="verse">Wind from the north, ground covered with rime,</div>
<div class="verse indent-2">A frost that made your limbs shiver;</div>
<div class="verse">Poor Mr. Macaw! this was not like the clime</div>
<div class="verse indent-2">On the banks of the Amazon River.</div>
</div>
<div class="stanza">
<div class="verse">So Mr. Macaw grew wise, as do men,</div>
<div class="verse indent-2">When taught by experience bitter;</div>
<div class="verse">He flew back to his cage, and determined then</div>
<div class="verse indent-2">He would never again be a flitter.'"</div>
</div></div>
</div>
<hr class="chap" />
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</SPAN></span></p>
<table class="sp2 mc w50" title="CAROLINA PAROQUET.">
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<td colspan="3"><span class="ac w100 figcenter">
<SPAN name="i_056.jpg" id="i_056.jpg"> <ANTIMG style="width:100%"
src="images/i_056.jpg" width="600" height="465" alt="" /></SPAN></span>
</td>
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<tr>
<td class="xx-smaller ac w30">FROM COL. CHI. ACAD. SCIENCES.<br/>
A. W. MUMFORD, PUBLISHER, CHICAGO.<br/>
285</td>
<td class="x-smaller ac w40">CAROLINA PAROQUET.<br/>
Life-size.</td>
<td class="xx-smaller ac w30">CHICAGO COLORTYPE CO.<br/>
COPYRIGHT 1899, BY<br/>
NATURE STUDY PUB. CO., CHICAGO.</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
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