IN THE SHETLANDS 157 
her garden. Several rows of boxes were arranged 
against one side of the house, but a less usual and 
more attractive feature was a pretty little rockery on 
the lawn beneath, about which the birds loved to be. 
They cooed and strutted, or sat basking and sunning, 
on every little pinnacle and “‘jutty frieze” of it, thus 
at the same time emphasising their descent from the 
rock-loving Columbia Livia and the dullness and want 
of taste of the average mortal who, when he keeps 
pigeons, never thinks of providing a rockery for them, 
in accordance with their inherited tastes and proclivi- 
ties. One glance was sufficient. It was instantly 
evident that not even on the most elegant cot do these 
pretty birds look nearly so pretty as amongst rocks 
and stones tastefully and conveniently arranged. This 
rockery was a flower-bed also, and with the flowers 
the pigeons did not interfere, whilst the beauty of 
them was greatly set off by their own, and their own 
by that of the flowers. The art of exhibiting birds 
and beasts to the most picturesque advantage, in which 
we should be equally studying both our and their 
happiness, as well as adding largely to our knowledge, 
is indeed hardly understood amongst us. 
Mrs. Saxby told me that her pigeons had attracted 
some peregrines to the neighbourhood, and that they 
had several times attacked them, but, as yet, without 
success. In one pursuit which she witnessed a par- 
ticular bird was singled out, separated from its 
companions, and struck at again and again, but al- 
ways managed to avoid the rush of the hawk, and, at 
