TIMELY INVOCATION.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume VIII, Issue 50, 12 December 1891, Page 688

TIMELY INVOCATION.

A MAIDEN lady, who lives alone except for her servants, owns a tine parrot which her nephew brought back from a visit to South America. The bird was sent to a professional trainer to be taught to speak, but when it was returned it obstinately refused to utter a word, ana its mistress decided that the teaching had been a failure. Polly’s cage hung in a dressing-room which adjoined its mistress’s chamber, and at night the door between the two rooms was left open. One night a burglar got into the house, and after packing up the silver below stairs, crept stealthily up to the chamber of the lady, where he proceeded to gather together her jewellery. He had got most of her valuables into a handbag without awakening her, when suddenly an unearthly voice from the next room called out loud enough to arouse the seven sleepers: ‘ God bless our home ! God bless our home !’

The burglar was so startled that he dropped his dark lantern, and then, in trying to recover it, stumbled over a chair and pitched headlong to the floor. The lady suddenly awakened, screamed at the top of her voice, and the thief, now thoroughly demoralized, took a flying leap for the stairway outside the door of the chamber. He slipped, fell, and broke his leg, so that he was easily captured by the butler and coacnman, who had come to the rescue of their mistress.

All this time the parrot had continued to cry at the top of its lungs : ‘ God bless our home I God bless our home !’

Polly evidently felt that the time for talking had come, and under the circumstances her mistress could not well get out of patience with her, although she screamed this one sentence for the rest of the night. Having begun to talk, indeed, she continued to chatter for the rest of her life, and was looked upon as a remarkably accomplished parrot.