146 THE ROCK DOVE. 



lofty and precipitous rocks of St. Abb's Head. " This 

 magnificent promontory," says Dr. Johnston, " is a huge 

 insulated mass of trap rocks, whose seaward sides form 

 precipices of vast height, hollowed in many places with 

 caverns, in which the wild Pigeons {Golumba livia) build 

 their nests and nurture their young in safety amid the 

 spray of waves that never sleep in rest. In some parts the 

 caverns penetrate far and end in darkness ; in others they 

 are pervious, and give a romantic passage by another open- 

 ing equally superb." ^ A little distance to the west of the 

 Lighthouse is the Cleaver Rock, immediately to the west of 

 which another retreat occurs. Bounding the Head, and just 

 before we reach Petticowick Harbour, we come to another 

 great fissure inhabited by Pigeons, with Guillemots on the 

 rocks above its entrance. Mr. Hardy writes to me that 

 further along the coast towards the west there are several 

 resorts of this bird about the Gull Rocks, in the neighbour- 

 hood of Fast Castle, and again at the Rammel Cove, which 

 is nearly opposite Dowlaw Mill Pond. He adds that it 

 likewise nests at Windylaw Cove, which is towards the 

 Redheugh Shore, at Siccar, and in the cave mouth at 

 Swallowcraig, and at Greenheugh, near Oldcambus. When 

 the mouth of one of these deep and dark caverns, moist 

 with the spray of the thundering surge, is entered by a 

 boat, the Pigeons dash out in great alarm, bringing to our 

 remembrance the following beautiful and descriptive lines 

 in Dryden's translation of Virgil : — 



As when a Dove her rocky hold forsakes, 

 Roused in a fright her sounding wings she shakes, 

 The cavern rings with clattering, out she flies, 

 And leaves her callow care and cleaves the skies ; 

 At tirst she flutters, l)iit at length she springs 

 To smoother flight, and shoots upon her wings. 



1 Address to the members of the Berwickshire Naturalists' Club by George 

 Johnston, M.D. (read at its first anniversary meeting held at Coldstream on the 

 19th of September 1832).— Mist. Ber. Xcd. Club, vol. i. p. 5. 



