88 BOOK OF BIRDS 



Britain only during the summer months, when in certain parts, as 

 in the eastern and midland counties, it is abundant. 



The Collared, or Barbary, Dove (Plate XVII. fig. i) is a near 

 relative of the Turtle-dove, and is to be met with from Constantinople 

 to India ; it is also abundant in the Holy Land. The so-called 

 " Turtle-dove " which is so commonly kept in cages is really the 

 Collared Dove, though the domesticated birds now form a race apart 

 from the wild species. 



In one respect the most remarkable of all the Pigeon tribe is the 

 Passenger Pigeon (Plate XVII. fig. 3), and this because of the 

 incalculable numbers which were to be met with not a century 

 ago in certain parts of the United States. A flock seen by the 

 naturalist Wilson was estimated by him to consist of more than 

 2,230 millions ! In the backwoods of Kentucky, Ohio, and Indiana 

 these birds literally swarmed. The celebrated naturalist Audubon, 

 in 1813, met with them crossing the barrens near Hardensburg in 

 enormous hosts ; so thickly packed were they flying, that they 

 obscured the light of the sun at noonday as effectively as an eclipse ! 



Another naturalist, Brewster, describing the nesting-place of 

 these birds in Michigan so recently as 1866, says : ''It began near 

 Petosky and extended north-east, past Crooked Lake, for twenty-eight 

 miles, averaging three or four miles wide. The birds arrived in 

 two separate bodies, the largest of which formed a compact mass of 

 Pigeons, at least five miles long by one mile wide. The nesting-area 

 extended for a distance of eight miles through hard-wood timber, 

 then crossed a river, . . . and thence stretched through pine-woods 

 about twenty miles." Many trees were piled with nests, so much 

 so, that their boughs broke down under the weight thereof. To-day 

 the Passenger Pigeon is almost extinct, so great is the persecution 

 to which this bird has been subjected. 



The largest of all living Pigeons is the Goura, or Crowned- 

 pigeon (Plate XVII. fig. 8). This bird is a native of New Guinea 

 and some of the neighbouring islands, and is a quite familiar bird 

 in Zoological Gardens. An even finer species is the Victoria Crowned- 

 pigeon from J obi and Mysori. Though it has several times bred 

 in captivity, it does not thrive as well as could be wished, having 

 regard to its great beauty. 



