90 BIBDS IX LOXDOX 



curve to its tree again, and listening to the 

 beautiful sound of its human-like plaint, which 

 may l)e heard not only in summer but on any 

 mild day in winter, one is apt to lose sight of the 

 increasingly artificial aspect of things; to forget 

 the havoc that has been wrought, until the 

 surviving trees — the decayed giants about whose 

 roots the cruel, hungry, glittering axe ever flits 

 and plays like a hawk-moth in the summer 

 twilight — no longer seem conscious of their 

 doom. 



Twentv years ago the wood-pio'eon was 

 almost unknown in London, the very few birds 

 that existed being confined to woods on the 

 borders of the metropolis and to some of the 

 old private parks — Eavenscourt, Brondesbury, 

 Clissold and Ih'ockwell Parks ; except two or 

 three pairs that bred in the group of fir trees on 

 the north side of Kensington Gardens, and one 

 pair in St. James's Park. Tree-felling caused 

 these l)irds to abandon the parks sometime 

 during the seventies. But from 1883, when a 

 single pair nested in Jhickingham Palace Gar- 

 dens, wood-pigeons have increased and spread 

 from year to year until tlie present time, when 

 there is not any park with large old trees, or 



