208 THE ROCK DOVE 
»> 4 
birds exposed for sale with Ring Doves, in London, on January 
4. It resorts in spring to the neighbourhood in which it was bred, 
' as a convenient place for rearing its own young, and at the end of 
summer repairs to woods and groves better adapted for supplying 
it with its favourite food, acorns and beech-mast. There it flocks 
together with Ring Doves, vast numbers of which assemble in 
winter in some districts, and when the fowler plies his occupation, 
shares their fate. It is, however, by no means so common a bird 
as the Ring Dove at any season, nor is it so generally distributed. 
In the North it is certainly only a summer visitor; and, on the 
other hand, it is most abundant in the south of Europe and in Africa 
during winter. 
THE ROCK DOVE 
COLUMBA LIVIA 
Plumage bluish ash, lighter on the wings; rump white; neck and breast 
lustrous with green and purple reflections, without a white spot; two 
transverse black bands on the wings; primaries and tail tipped with 
black ; rump white; outer tail-feather white on the outer web; irides 
pale orange; bill black; feet red. Length twelve and a half inches. 
Eggs white. 
THE Rock Dove, though a bird of extensive range, is less generally 
known in its natural condition than either of the other British 
species. As its name imports, its favourite place of resort is the 
rocky coast; but this it frequents, not because it has any pre- 
dilection for the seashore and its productions, but that its instincts 
teach it to make lofty rocks its stronghold, just as the natural 
impulse of the Ring Dove is to find safety in the forests. If this 
species is the original of all the numerous varieties of tame Pigeon, 
it must inhabit most countries of the eastern hemisphere; for a 
pigeon-fancier’s dove-cot, to be complete, must contain several 
sorts which were first brought from remote regions; and we know 
that in Egypt, Phcenicia, and Persia, Pigeons had a mythological 
importance at an early date. It is said that the Pigeons which 
have established themselves in various public buildings of con- 
tinental cities, as Saint Mark at Venice, and Pont Neuf at Paris, 
are exclusively Rock Pigeons; and I have seen it stated that they 
frequent the towers of Canterbury Cathedral; but it is possible 
that these may be in all cases derived from tame birds escaped 
from domestication, and resuming, to a certain extent, their wild 
habits and original plumage. That they resort to ruinous edifices 
near the sea in retired districts is beyond question, as I have seen 
them flying about and alighting on the walls of an old castle in the 
island of Kerrera, near Oban, in the Western Highlands, indif- 
ferent, seemingly, whether they nestled in the lofty cliffs on the 
mainland, where they are numerous, or on the equally secure ruins 
