“A mountain district very remote, between Trelawney and St. Ann’s, here and there cleared and settled,—a peculiar country called the _Black grounds_, is said to be the never failing resort of these Mexican Macaws. I have been assured that several birds have been procured there. This is said to be nearly as far eastward as they have been found. Further westward, in the neighbourhood of the Accompong Maroons, young birds, bearing the evidence of being in the first year’s plumage, have been procured from hog-hunters. One specimen, purchased from them by Mr. White, the proprietor of Oxford estate, was for some time the admiration and talk of the country round. I have been informed by those who have noticed the bird on the wing, that although the Macaws are never seen but flying extremely high, their great size, and their splendid length of tail, brilliant with intense scarlet, and blue and yellow, strikingly attract attention, if their harsh scream, heard in the hushed mountain solitudes, does not betray them. They fly from one ridge to another, journeying in pairs, and have been followed by the eye till they have alighted on the loftiest of the forest trees, in their chosen resting places.” YELLOW-BELLIED PARROQUET.[75] _Conurus flaviventer._ _Psittacus æruginosus_, _var._ +Lath.+ Syn. _Aratinga flaviventer_, +Spix+. Av. Br. t. 18. f. 1. [75] Length, measured over the head, 11³⁄₄ inches, expanse 16³⁄₄, flexure 5³⁄₄, tail 5, rictus ³⁄₄, tarsus ⁵⁄₁₀, middle toe 1¹⁄₁₀. Irides pale orange; cere and cheeks, pale buff. The large earthy nests accumulated by the duck-ants (_Termites_,) around the trunk or branches of trees, frequently afford the Parroquet a fit situation for her own domestic economy. Though easily cut by her strong beak, the thin arches and galleries of these insects are of sufficiently firm consistence to constitute a secure and strong abode. In the cavity formed by her own industry she lays four or five eggs, upon the chips and dust.