ickly from their gobblings when they have captured a hare. If they
meet him standing still or lying down, they form in a circle around
him, and, putting their heads down, repeat continually their peculiar
cries. The hare remains quiet, and it is sometimes possible to take
him up, terrorized as he is in the midst of the black circle of
gobbling beaks and heads. The language of the turkeys is at that time
incontestably significant. It is warlike, and similar to that of the
males when they are fighting. In the present instance they have joined
for war, and they make it on the frightened hare.

My Jaco, like all parrots, which are excellent imitators, pronounces a
few words and repeats them over and over again. Such birds amuse us
because the words they know sometimes happen to be ludicrously
fitting. A bird of this kind had been struck by the note sounded by
the wind blowing into a room through a crack in the glass work
whenever a certain door was opened; and he had become so perfect in
his imitation that they sometimes, on hearing the noise, went to shut
the door when it was not open.

Jaco formerly belonged to a very pious old lady who was accustomed to
say her litanies with another person. He had caught the words "Pray
for us," in the invocations to the several saints, and said them so
well as sometimes to deceive his learned mistress, and cause her to
think she was saying her litanies with two colleagues. When Jaco was
out of food, and any one passed by him, he would say, "My poor
Cocotte!" or "My poor rat!" in an arch, mawkish, protracted tone that
indicated very clearly what he wanted, and that his drinking cup was
empty. There was no doubt in the house as to his meaning; and whenever
one heard it he said: "He has nothing to eat." He was exceedingly fond
of fresh pits of apples and pears, and I was in the habit of
collecting them and keeping them to give him. So whenever, as I came
near him, I put my hand into my pocket he never failed to say: "Poor
Cocco!" in a supplicating tone which it was impossible to mistake. A
sugar plum is a choice morsel to him. He can tell what it is from a
distance when I hold it out in my fingers; and when I give it to him
he cannot restrain himself if it has been any considerable time since
he has had the delicacy. Usually, after having made the first motion
to get it, as if he were ravished and wanted to express his joy in
advance, he would draw back before taking it, and say, in a com