“Well, you see, uncle, they have got such hooked beaks,” I said, in a helpless sort of way.
“Ha! ha! ha!” he laughed. “Why, what a reason, Nat! I might as well say I would not eat snipe, or woodcock, because it has such a long straight beak. Turn your skewer, Nat. They are beginning to smell maddeningly nice. They’re as fat as butter. Nothing like a walk such as ours to give you an appetite. There, take the big tin and go and fill it with Adam’s ale.”
I ran to the rock pool and filled the tin with the cool clear water, and came back to the fire.
“They’ll soon be done, Nat,” said my uncle. “Yes, my boy, I should eat parrots, and shall eat a good many, I hope. Why, look here, Nat, what do parrots eat?”
“Sop and seed and sugar,” I said.
“Yes, when they are shut up in a cage at home, Nat; but fruit, my boy, in their native state. There, you may take that as a rule, that all birds that live on seed or fruit are good for food.”
“And those that live on prey, uncle, are bad,” I said.
“Well, no; that won’t do, Nat. Parrots are delicious. I’ve eaten dozens. And so are some birds that live on small prey—ducks and geese, for instance, eat a great many live things; and the birds that live on insects are, some of them, very good. I think we may say birds of light diet are all good, and draw the line at all carrion or raptorial birds. I should not like to eat hawk, owl, or anything of the crow family; but there is no knowing, Nat, what we might do if half-starved, and that’s what I am now. Nat, my boy, the birds are done. Now for a glorious feast! I’m sure I shall pick the bones of my two.”
“And I’m sure I shall, uncle. I was never so hungry in my life.”
“Then now to begin, my boy; give me that tin plate and say grace, if we are in the wilds. What’s become of all the savages?”