Psittacus eupatrius, Russ. Synonyms: Paloeornis Alexandri, Vgrs., Jrd.; Psittacus Alexandri, Bchst., Lthm.; Psittacus neglectus, Psittacus torquatus, Conurus Alexandri auctorum; etc., etc.

German: Der grosse Alexander-Sittich.

Alexandrine Parrakeet.

French: La grande Perruche a Collier, Vllt.

A CONSIDERABLE amount of confusion exists with regard to the different species of Palceornes, in consequence of various authors having imposed upon several of them the specific designations of Alexander and torquatus; so that it becomes a matter of some consequence to clearly individualise each species, in order to obviate for the future the possibility of one of them being mistaken for the other.

Speaking of the genus, Paloeornis, Mr. Vigors observes: "The birds that compose it are at first sight distinguished by their superior elegance and gracefulness of form. This character is considerably increased by the construction of the tail, the two middle feathers of which far exceed the rest in length."

The bird which forms the subject of the present notice, is a native of India, and is also found in the adjacent islands, whence it is not unfrequently imported into this country, although not as often as its smaller congener, the Ring-necked, Psittacus, or Palceornis torquatus, also called the Bengal Parrakeet, of which we propose giving a description in the next chapter.

The Alexandrine Parrot, if named after the great Emperor of Macedonia, deserves the appellation, for he is, literally, the greatest of his race, measuring some twenty inches in extreme length, twelve of which, however, are occupied by the tail; the body is slim and compactly made, but the head is large, and the beak of formidable dimensions; still his majesty can scarcely be called a handsome bird, nor is he of exactly royal, not to say imperial aspect; but he is not a bad fellow nevertheless, and, if taken young, can be made a very agreeable companion.

The prevailing colour of the plumage is grass green, the back of the neck is marked by a broad crescentic patch of pinky-rose; and a narrow ring of black, starting from the insertion of the mandibles, on both sides, passes round the neck, forming a complete circle; the beak is orange-red, and there is a large dull-red spot on the shoulder on either side.

The female may be recognised by the absence of the black necklet, and is rather smaller than her mate, with a somewhat shorter tail.

These birds breed in hollow trees, where the female lays three or four white eggs: when the young are brought up by hand, they become very tame and docile, and learn to speak fairly well; they are hardy too, for one of them has survived in the Parrot House of the London Zoological Gardens since 1873.

It is somewhat doubtful whether this or the smaller Ring-necked species is the bird that was known to the ancients, the Parrot of which Aristotle and Pliny wrote, and in honour of whom Horace composed one of his most charming poems.

In captivity, this Parrot is to be fed and treated as already recommended for the species noticed in the foregoing pages, not Lories; namely, on seeds of different kinds, canary, hemp, oats, maize or barley, and vegetables of sorts, such as carrot, potato, etc., whether raw or cooked; but on no account should it be given either milk, sop, meat or bones, and it should always have access to water, no less for drinking than for bathing purposes.

To us it is a mystery how, or where, the notion that Parrots do not drink can have arisen in this country; and it will be no fault of ours if it be not shortly relegated to the limbo of defunct superstitions, in company with many another time-honoured, but pernicious, "vulgar error." We positively lose all patience when we think of it, and are compelled to pull up short, or we should go on descanting upon the enormity and cruelty of the practice, until our readers grew weary and closed the book in despair, not to say disgust, a consummation that we hasten to avoid by passing on to the consideration of other matters connected with our subject.

Referring to the power possessed by these birds of contracting and expanding at will the iris, a correspondent writes: "She (the Parrot) has a peculiar way of contracting her eye when preparing to do, or actually doing, anything mischievous: when so contracted, the pupil of the eye appears as it were a mere speck of jet. I believe that her fondness for, and her sympathetic attachment to, me was something more than mere instinct, for if I think strangely of her at any time, even in the middle of the night, she is sure to answer me with her own little note, her eyes remaining shut, and her head tucked in her shoulder, as though she were fast asleep,"

That is "thought reading" to some purpose, and, as the writer of the above note truly Bays, shows "something more than mere instinct": it would really seem now and then as if an erring sylph, or sprite, had been condemned to pass a certain period of its existence under the form of one of these cunning-looking birds, so remarkable is their intelligence, though not always, it must be confessed, made use of to the best advantage; for occasionally the indwelling sprite seems rather to be a gnome, or a black dwarf endowed with malicious propensities, than a beneficent fairy, such as we read of in the "good old times" when we wore pinafores, and had no cares but lessons.

The great fault of all these birds is their extreme noisiness, and with every care, and much patience, we have not been able to succeed in breaking one of them of the habit, though we have succeeded in preventing their acquiring it, and others have been more fortunate than we; the Rev. J. G. Wood, for instance, who, writing about one of these birds, says:

"This species of Parrot is not very good at talking, though it can learn to repeat a few words, and is very apt at communicating its own ideas by a language of gesture and information especially its own. It is, however, very docile, and will soon learn any lesson that may be imposed, even that most difficult task to a Parrot - remaining silent while any one is speaking. One of my pupils had one of these birds, of which he was exceedingly fond; and finding that although his body was in the schoolroom below, his mind was with his Polly in the room above, I allowed her to stay in the room on condition that the lesson should be properly learned. At first, however, Polly used to screech so continually that all lessons were stopped for the time, and I was fearful that Polly must be banished. However I soon overcame the difficulty, for every time that Polly screamed I used to put her into a dark cupboard, and not release her for some time. She soon found out my meaning, and it was very amusing to see her push out her head ready for a scream, and then check herself suddenly. She was a very nice Polly, and became a great favourite; her great treat was half a walnut, which she held tightly in one claw, while she delicately prized out the kernel with her hooked beak and horny tongue. The end of the poor bird was very tragic; she got out of a window, flew to a tree, and was there shot by a stupid farmer" - one of those bovine-brained agriculturists that massacred the Parrots the late Mr. C. Buxton would otherwise have successfully acclimatised at Northrepps Hall.

Well, Mr. Wood, seemingly, was no prentice hand at tuition, which may, no doubt does, account for his success in mastering the Alexandrine favourite of his pupil: we have made the same attempt, with more than one Parrot, Parrakeet and Cockatoo, but always with the same result - ignominious discomfiture. We are in no wise disheartened, however, and mean to try again - and again if it should be necessary, but as we have said, the acquisition of the habit can certainly be prevented.

All these birds are extremely fond of company, and cannot bear to be left alone for an instant; hence they are more suitable for out-door aviaries, or a conservatory where, swinging on a perch, or hung up against a background of elms or lime-trees, or of palms and tree ferns, as the case may be, they add materially to the attractiveness of the scene, and their screaming is not as noticeable as when they are kept in a room.

They are very sensitive too, and take likings and dislikings at first sight; nor can any subsequent conduct of the individual concerned induce them to modify their first impressions.

Some of them become friendly at once with all their lady visitors, and object most vehemently to men and boys; while others again are women-haters, and will allow a man to do anything with them: scratch their head, take them out of their cage, feed them from between his lips, and so on; and when they have once formed an attachment, no matter how ill-placed it may be, nothing will induce them to transfer it elsewhere, they are nothing if not constant; their motto, "Foi est tout."

Volumes might be, and actually have been, filled with anecdotes of this favourite bird and its congeners, but we shall content ourselves with one related by Mr. Gedney, in his entertaining and instructive little work on Parrots and Parrakeets. - "It was my miserable fate," writes that gentleman, "to be left in ill-health at Singapore, suffering, in fact, from that species of 'lead-poisoning* which was very common during the Indian mutiny, and although it was, perhaps, unreasonable of me not to 'slip my cable' when such a result was expected, still I had a young Joque monkey and a Ring-necked Parrakeet, and their presence did more towards my recovery than all the physic, lint and lotion of old Bolus. Poor Jacko had a knotted rope suspended from the rafter; with a few cross pieces of wood put through the strands, making perches, upon which he dozed and plotted schemes of revenge against Polly, or, it may be, meditated upon the chances of stealing her banana out of the sand-tray at the bottom of his rope-ladder, without being detected in the act.

"The great fun was to watch her and Jacko in their contests for the upper perch. Polly having taken her 'tiffin', was disposed for an afternoon nap, and she accordingly commenced to mount the rope-ladder, but Jacko immediately set up a chatter, savagely showing his teeth meanwhile, and shaking the rope violently to impede the movements of Poll. In spite of this, up she goes steadily, hand over hand, nearer and nearer to the coveted perch, on which sits the monkey in a boiling passion, and trembling with excitement. Holding on by his tail and hind legs, he now attempts to get hold of Poll, but she snaps at his hands right and left, with a rapidity that is perfectly astounding, and presently a shriek of pain announces that her beak has drawn blood, and down drops poor Jacko like a stone, whilst Poll takes quiet possession of the perch, where, after repeating a few self-congratulary notes, she dozes off as if nothing had happened. Jacko meanwhile sits upon his haunches, examining his bite with a very rueful countenance; but a little petting from me sets him right, and a thorough examination of everything eatable and drinkable having been made, he goes regularly to work to 'blow the steam off.'

"Making the rope-ladder his centre, he performs a series of splendid jumps to it from all the articles of furniture in the room - much to the disgust of Polly - and then, after a headlong rush round the apartment, he bounds up the ladder like a flash of lightning, and makes a grab at Polly's tail, dropping at once to the ground, to escape the consequences of this daring act. The bird, however, was never injured by him in this way, for she watched his every movement, the only time that he ever stole a march upon her was once when she happened to be feeding in the sand-tray, immediately beneath the rope-ladder, down which her stealthy enemy slipped like a serpent, and making a snatch caught her by the base of her tail.

"At that moment a well directed bunch of bananas from me hit him in the chest, and down he came, whereupon Poll seized him by the fleshy part of the lower arm and bit it through.

"This was a lesson which he never forgot, and although his devilment compelled him to annoy Poll, as a source of fun, still he grew to respect, if he did not love her."

A couple of companions like the above were certainly enough to make a young fellow well, in spite of doctors and 'lead-poisoning', and we feel glad on reading it that the narrator was spared to tell the tale.

There is no doubt the subject of the present notice is quite as susceptible of being tamed as any of its congeners, although we have recently seen it stated that such is not the case: several specimens that, at various times, have come under our own observation were as gentle and amiable as they could well be, and apparently much attached to their owners. They vary, however, immensely in disposition, but all of them are extremely impatient of solitude, and, where practicable, should be kept in pairs; not necessarily with a view to breeding them, but in order, by providing them with congenial society, that they may not acquire the objectionable habit of shrieking, so common to all the race, when kept in solitary confinement.

The Hon. And Rev. F. G. Dutton's Account Of The Alexandrine Parrakeet (Palaeornis Eupatrius)

This bird has even greater disadvantages as a pet than the Bengal Parrakeet, inasmuch as its screams are even more disagreeable, and its bill is much more formidable, being nearly as large as a Macaw's. But it can be made as tame, and taught to talk as well as the Bengal Parrakeet. One of these, by the way, made an instance of the third species of Paloeornis which I have let out, and which has not returned to its cage. The other species were the Bengal and the Blossom-head.