I am a native of one of the most splendid regions of the earth, where
nature dispenses all her bounties with a liberal hand; and where man
and bird are released from half the penalties to which, in other climes,
their flesh is heir. I was born in one of those superb forests of fruit
and flowers so peculiar to the Brazils, which stood at no great distance
from an Indian village, and was not far removed from an European
settlement. This forest was impervious to human footsteps. A nation of
apes occupied the interior; and the dynasty of the Psittacus Severus,
or Brazilian queen macaw, inhabited the upper regions.--Several
subject-states of green and yellow parrots constituted our colonial
neighbours. My family held the highest rank in the privileged classes
of our oligarchy; for our pride would not admit of a king, and our
selfishness (so I must call it) would allow of no rights. We talked
nevertheless in our legislative assemblies of our happy constitution,
which by tacit agreement we understood to mean "happy for ourselves;"
but the green and yellow parrots too plainly showed a strong disposition
to put another interpretation on the phraseology. My paternal nest was
situated in the hollow of one of the most ancient and lofty trees in the
forest. It had once been rich in fruit and flowers, gums and odours,
and all in the same season; and though it was now scathed at the top,
hollow in the trunk, and was threatened with total ruin from the first
hurricane, we still preferred it, because it _was_ the oldest. I owed
all my early impressions, and much of my acquired superiority, to my
great grandfather, who lived to an extreme old age, and attained a
celebrity, of which we were ourselves at that time unaware. He was
the identical bird which was brought from Marignan to Prince Maurice,
governor of the Brazils, and whose pertinent answers to many silly
questions are recorded in the pages of the greatest of English
philosophers. My great grandfather was soon disgusted with the folly
and cruelty of what is called civilized life; and having seen an Indian
roasted alive for a false religion's sake, he thought that some day they
might take it into their heads to do as much by a macaw, for the same
reason. So he availed himself of an early opportunity of retiring
without leave from the service, and returned to his native forest, where
his genius and learning at once raised him to the highest honours of
the Psittacan aristocracy. Influenced by his example, I early felt the
desire of visiting foreign countries. My mother too (who, though fond
and indulgent, like all the mothers of our race, was as vain and foolish
as any that I have since met with in human society) worked powerfully
on my ambition, by her constant endeavours to "push me up the tree,"
as she called it, in her way. I was already a first-rate orator, and a
member of the great congress of macaws; while in our social re-unions
I left all the young birds of fashion far behind me: and as I not only
articulated some human sounds picked up from the Indians, but could
speak a few words of Portuguese and Dutch, learned by rote from my great
grandfather, I was considered a genius of high order. With the conceit,
therefore, of all my noble family, I was prompted to go forth and visit
other and better worlds, and to seek a sphere better adapted to the
display of my presumed abilities, than that afforded by our domestic
senate and home-spun society. On one of those celestial nights, known
only in the tropical regions, I set forth on my travels, directing my
course to the Portuguese settlement, which the youthful vigour of my
wing enabled me to reach by the break of morning. Having refreshed
myself with a breakfast of fruit, after the exhaustion of my nocturnal
flight, I ascended a spacious palm tree, which afforded an admirable
view of the adjacent country, and a desirable shelter from the ardours
of the rising sun. My first impulse was to take a bird's-eye view of the
novel scene which lay before me, and I gazed around for some minutes
with intense delight; but fatigue gradually obtained the mastery over
curiosity, and, putting my head unconsciously beneath my wing, I fell
into a profound sleep. How long this continued, I know not; but I was
suddenly awakened by a strange muttering of unknown voices. I looked,
and beheld two creatures whose appearance greatly surprised me. They had
nothing of the noble form and aspect of our Indian neighbours. One of
them considerably resembled the preacher-monkey in countenance and
deportment; his head was denuded of hair, and his person was covered by
a black substance, which left no limb visible except his ancles and
feet, which were very much like those of an ape. The other had all the
air of a gigantic parrot: he had a hooked bill, a sharp look, a yellow
head; and all the rest of his strange figure was party-coloured, blue,
green, red, and black. I classed him at once as a specimen of the
Psittacus Ochropterus. The ape and the parrot seemed to have taken
shelter beneath the palm tree, like myself, for the purposes of shade
and repose. They had beside them a basket filled with dead game, fruit,
and honey; and the parrot had a long instrument near him on the ground,
which I afterwards learned was a fowling-piece. They talked a strange
jargon of different intonation, like that of the respective chatter of
the grey and the green parrots. Both seemed to complain, and, by the
expression of their ugly and roguish faces, to interrogate each other.
As soon as they went away, I endeavoured to mutter to myself the sounds
they had uttered, but could retain only two phrases. The one had been
spoken by the ape, and ran thus--"Shure it was for my sweet sowl's
sake, jewel;" the other was--"Eh, sirs, it was aw' for the love of the
siller." I was extremely amused by my acquisition; and, being convinced
that I was now qualified to present myself at the settlement, was about
to descend from my altitude, when the two strangers returned: they had
come back for the gun, which they had left behind them. As they picked
it up, it went off, and I was startled into one of my loudest screams.
The strangers looked at me with great delight, he whom I likened to the
parrot exclaiming--"Weel, mon, what brought you here?" I answered in his
own words, for want of better--"Eh, sirs, it was aw' for the love of
the siller." He dropped his piece, and fled in consternation, calling
lustily--"Its auld clooty himsen, mon, its auld Horny, I tell ye; come
awa, come awa." His friend, who seemed more acquainted with our species,
encouraged him to return; and offering me some fruit from his basket,
said--"Why, Poll, you cratur, what brought you so far from home?" I
endeavoured to imitate his peculiar tone, and replied--"Why thin it was
for my sweet sowl's sake, jewel."--"Why then," said my interlocutor,
coolly (for I never forgot his words) "that bird bates cockfighting."
They now both endeavoured to catch me. It was all I wanted, and I
perched on the preaching-monkey's wrist, while he took up the basket
in his left hand, and in this easy and commodious style of travelling,
we proceeded. On approaching the settlement, a fierce dispute arose
between the friends; of which, by each tearing me from the other, I was
evidently the object; and I am quite sure that I should have been torn
to pieces between them, but for the timely approach of a person who
issued from a lofty and handsome edifice on the road side, attended by
a train of preacher-monkeys, of which he was the chief. He was quite a
superior looking being to either of my first acquaintance, who cowered
and shrunk beneath his eagle look. They seemed humbly to lay their cases
before him; when, after looking contemptuously on both, he took me to
himself, caressed me, and giving me to an attendant, said--"This bird
belongs to neither, it is the property of mother church:" and the
property of mother church I remained for some years. Of my two friends
of the palm-tree, one, the preacher-monkey, turned out to be a poor
Irish lay brother, of the convent of which my new master (an Irishman
too) was the superior. My yellow parrot was a Scotch adventurer, who
came out to give lectures on _poleetical economy_ to the Brazilians:
and who, finding that they had no taste for moral science, had become
a servant of all-work to the brotherhood. My dwelling was a missionary
house of the Propaganda, established for the purpose of converting
(i.e. burning) the poor Indians. The Superior, Father Flynn, had
recently arrived from Lisbon with unlimited powers. He was clever,
eloquent, witty, and humorous; but panting for a bishopric in his native
country, he was principally employed in theological writings, which
might bring him into notice and hasten his recall to Europe.
Next to the servant's hall of a great English family, the first place
in the world for completing the education of a macaw of genius, is a
convent. Its idleness and ennui render a monkey, or a parrot, a valuable
resource; and between what I picked up, and what I was taught by the
monks of the Propaganda, my acquirements soon became stupendous. Always
following my kind master from the refectory to the church, assisting at
mess or at mass, being near him in the seclusion of the oratory, and in
the festivities, he frequently held with his more confidential friends;
I had loaded my astonishing memory with scraps of theology and of fun.
I could sing a French drinking song, taught me by the sub-prior Frere
Jacques, and intonate a "Gloria in Excelsis" with a true nasal twang.
I had actually learned the Creed in English;[3] and could call all the
brothers by their name. I had even learned the Savoyard's dance from
my friend Frère Jacques, and sung "Gai Coco" at the same time, like
Scaliger's parrot, from whose history Frère Jacques took the idea
of teaching me. I did this, it must be acknowledged, with great
awkwardness, turning in my toes, and often tumbling backwards in a
clumsy and ludicrous way. But this amused my religious friends more than
all the rest; for, like the great, they loved a ridicule as well as a
talent; and, provided they were amused, were not nice as to the means.
My fame soon began to spread on all sides, and the anecdotes told of the
macaw of the Propaganda soon reached the circles of the Governor of the
Brazils, who wrote to request the pleasure of my company for a few weeks
at the palace. This was a compliment which he had never paid to the
learned superior of the order, and my master was evidently hurt. He
declined therefore the invitation for me, on the plea that he would
soon visit Rio Janeiro himself, when I should accompany him into the
vice-regal presence.
This visit shortly took place, not for the object supposed by the
community, (who parted with me, even for a short time, with great
regret,) but for another purpose. The British ambassador, Lord ----, who
had recently arrived at Rio, was a countryman of Father Flynn's. He
enjoyed eminent literary celebrity, was a delightful poet, and well
acquainted with the Portuguese language. The superior had no doubt that
his own literary and theological merits were equally known to his
excellency, whom he visited with a view to negotiating a passage in the
British man of war; for he had been called on a secret mission to
Ireland, and wished to depart without notifying his intention to the
subaltern of the Propaganda. I was not included in the muster-roll of
this expedition; but anxious to lose no opportunity of seeing the world,
and desirous of beholding the Governor, who had shown his taste and
politeness by inviting me to his court, I contrived to nestle myself in
the carriage without the superior's knowledge, and followed his steps to
the very ante-room of the embassy. It was too late to send me back; for
I was instantly seized by a company of pretty young animals, the very
reverse in appearance of the preacher-monkeys of the Propaganda; they
all seemed to find in me a kindred soul: my master was ushered into the
cabinet, and I was left with my new acquaintance, who were called
"_attachés_," but whom I at once classed with the secretary-birds,[4]
while here and there, I thought, was mingled among them a specimen of
the booby, or Pelicanus Sula. Two of these mischievous creatures seemed
to delight in tormenting me from mere idleness and ennui, which I bore
for some time with great patience, as I saw the boobies pay them much
respect. One was called Lord Charles, and the other the Hon. Mr. Henry.
I learned these names with facility, and contrived to repeat them, as
they had been taught me, by the frequent iteration of one of the
boobies.
[3] "Rhodoginus mentions a parrot which could recite correctly the
whole of the Apostle's Creed."--Animal Biography, by the Rev.
W. Bingley.
[4] "The Dutch," says Le Vaillant, "give this bird the name of
Secretary, on account of the bunch of quills behind its
head."--Bingley, Animal Biography.
(_To be continued._)
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