241 



twenty-eight years. It was "of age "when she first 

 got it, and it lias been with another sister at Duffield 

 Park now over two 3'^ears, living in a sunn}'^ room, 

 having a blind old Canary as companion. It will not 

 suffer another Dove to be in the same room, but is a 

 friendly, beautiful creature, full of cooings and laugh- 

 ter if its friends enter the room. 



When talking of these Doves to Lady P'arren of 

 Bealings House, Suffolk, a few days ago, she told me 

 that her family had bad remarkable intimacies with 

 wild birds. A pair of Swallows, for instance, had 

 built their nest, a few years ago, in her bedroom on 

 the top of a large picture frame. A cloth was hung 

 over the picture to preserve it. First the birds made 

 a little ridge of bird masonr}^ along the edge of the 

 frame, and behind this the nest was placed. From 

 first to last all was kept scrupulously neat and clean. 

 All untidy ])its and the mutings were carried away 

 through the windows in the beak of one of the parents. 

 Before the family were ready for flight a liltle silver 

 band was fixed round a bird's leg. The following year 

 Swallows again came and built in that bedroom, but 

 not the marked one. The third year this bird returned, 

 however, with a mate, and was warmly welcomed. 

 The children declare that he is a perfect little gentle- 

 man, helping his mate in ever}^ department of family 

 life. They and the nest have been photographed b}^ 

 Mr. Richard Kearton, and the birds' doings have been 

 chronicled by one of Lady Farren's little girls in a 

 nature-book, which took the prize in its class at the 

 recent nature study exhibition. J. A. O." 



The above appeared in the Pall Mall Gazette of 

 Nov. 28, 1903, and is so interesting as to deserve pre- 

 servation in our pages. I make no doubt but that 

 such instances of deviation on the part of birds from 

 their ancestral habit of fear of man could be multi- 

 plied. I myself have met with a case. A Canary 



