[Two Children with Parrot]

A parrot steals the spotlight in this charming picture of two children, both beautifully turned out in their fanciest attire: ruffled collar, lace gloves, a ribboned brooch. The exotic bird, as a sign of affluence, complements the stack of books steadied by the young girl with braids. Both bird and books are hand colored, an additional extravagance to memorialize their visit to Maria Chambefort, an itinerant French daguerreotypist then installed in the village of Marcigny. While the type of parrot pictured isn’t definitive, it bears similarities to the Blue-bellied Parrot, which was commemorated and illustrated by Jean-Théodore Descourtilz in his 1834 Oiseaux brillans du Brésil: "Capable of being educated, the liveliness and grace of its movements are striking, and even if it cannot speak, it compensates those who care for it and to whom it easily becomes attached through the gentleness of its character and the pleasantness of its song."