But he
never succeeded, the round fruit would roll and slip away every time.
He never seemed to think of taking it in his beak. His tongue was in
constant use to find out the nature of everything he saw; a nail-hole
in a board or any similar hole was carefully explored. If he was held
near the face he would soon be attracted by the eye and thrust his
tongue into it. In this way he gained the respect of a number of
half-grown cats that were around the house. I wished to make them
familiar to each other, so there would be less danger of their killing
him. So I would take them both on my knee, when the bird would soon
notice the kitten's eyes, and leveling his bill as carefully as a
marksman levels his rifle, he would remain so a minute when he would
dart his tongue into the cat's eye. This was held by the cats to be
very mysterious: being struck in the eye by something invisible to
them. They soon acquired such a terror of him that they would avoid
him and run away whenever they saw his bill turned in their direction.
He never would swallow a grasshopper even when it was placed in his
throat; he would shake himself until he had thrown it out of his mouth.
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