He learned to come to the window every morning at breakfast-time for a
piece of bread-and-butter, and if the window was closed he would rap
impatiently upon it with his beak. He roosted in the orchard just
across the road on the trunk of an ancient leaning apple-tree. One
night Bell heard a terrible fluttering, and looking out saw a fox
making off with the peacock; he shouted and the fox dropped the
peacock and bolted. Gabriel was not hurt, but sadly ruffled inwardly
and outwardly, though, next day, he was quite happy and apparently
unconscious of his narrow escape. But alas! some months later Reynard
paid another visit, and poor Gabriel was never seen again. Some years
after we bought another pair, not nearly so tame as the first, and
sometimes flying on to the cottage roofs and scraping holes in the
thatch in which to bask in the sun. The villagers complained that the
birds sat under their black currant bushes, and devoured the currants
as fast as they ripened! We could not keep them within bounds, and
later sold them to St. John's College, Oxford, where we saw them soon
afterwards in good plumage, and exactly in keeping with their
beautiful surroundings.
One of my neighbours appeared to find these birds a special
infliction, and complained of the invasion of his premises by "them
paycocks." The word "pea" is always rendered "pay" in Worcestershire,
and, like "tay" for "tea," is probably the old correct pronunciation.
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