70 INDIAN PIGEONS AND DOVES 
to by some writers as peculiar to this particular species, but this is 
not so. All the Green Pigeon—some half dozen—well known to me 
in life, have this, or a very similar note, though I do not think any of 
them employ it quite so freely as this bird does. It is an argumen- 
tative or angry note, I think, and the ordinary conversational notes, 
though somewhat the same, are much softer and very low, so low indeed, 
that one must be very close to the utterer to overhear them. The 
whistling-notes, to me, seem much the same as those of the other species, 
but most observers say they are not so sweet and melodious, as well 
as being less sustained and more jerky. 
It consorts freely with other species when feeding, and though 
so much smaller than most of them, allows no bullying and can hold 
its own well, even with the bigger birds. Its flight is very strong and 
swift, and owing to its exceptionally tough skin and very dense feathers 
it requires a very straight, hard-hitting gun to deal with it effectively. 
As far as I can remember I have seen no big bag made exclusively of 
this Green Pigeon, but I have several times seen forty or fifty shot— 
amongst others—in an afternoon, and now and then small bags of 
twenty to forty couple will be found to be made up almost entirely 
of them. 
They sometimes ascend the hills to at least as high as 4,000 ft., 
and are common enough up to 3,000, but they are also equally at home 
right away in the plains at long distances from any mountains. 
Like all Green Pigeons it is essential that the country they inhabit 
should be well wooded, but they are by no means exclusively forest- 
birds, and are frequently seen in more or less open plains and extensive 
clearings, feeding on the fruit of the few trees which have been left 
standing. 
Just as they share the family failing of bad temper so, also, they 
share the family trait of greediness, and these small birds will continue 
to swallow huge plums and other fruit until their crops almost burst, 
and when they are shot and fall to the ground their crops are so full 
that they generally do give way, whilst their breasts, lined with thick 
yellow fat, also often burst open. Undoubtedly these birds in a wild 
state eat grain as well as fruit, for though I have never seen them in 
a grain-field, I have more than once shot birds with rice in their crops, 
and once one with some tiny millet in it. In captivity they take to 
grain freely, but at the same time they prefer soft fruit or boiled rice, 
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