144 British Birds ^ 



trees, sometimes in open holes or hollows in old trees ; 

 and very commonly, in some districts, either on the 

 ground below thick furze-bushes, or in deserted 

 rabbit-burrows, two or three feet distant from the 

 entrance. The nest is very sliglit, consistmg merely 

 of a few twigs or roots. The eggs are two in number, 

 pure white, about or rather exceeding \\ inch in 

 length, by IJ inch in breadth. 



ROCK V>0'^'^—{Colnmha livid). 



Wild Pigeon, Rock Pigeon, Wild Dove, Doo, 

 Rockier. — This pigeon has usually, until not long 

 since, been confused with the Stock Dove. But their 

 plumage is unlike, their voice unlike, and especially 

 their habits and living and breeding haunts ^ unlike. 

 It is believed with some certainty that the Rock Dove 

 is the real origin of the Domestic Pigeon, and certainly 

 any one who has seen the large flights of Domestic 

 Pigeons turned wild, which frequent the caverns in 

 the rock-bound coast near St. Abb's Head and similar 

 localities, living with, flying with, feeding with, and 

 nesting with the undoubted wild Rockier, can enter- 

 tain but very small doubts on the subject. The Rock 

 Dove makes a loose nest of twigs and plant-stems and 



1 This is subject to some qualifications. Both species breed in this 

 neighbourhood, and both nest in holes or rifts among the sandstone 

 cliffs of the country. I have again and again seen the Rock Dove 

 leave such nesting-sites, and again and again recognised the Stock 

 Dove in the same locality. Twice within the last two or three years 

 I have come upon birds of one or the other species (which I could 

 not positively identify, but believe to have been the Rock Dove) 

 feeding on the bilberry fruit, and in close company v.'ith numerous 

 Ring Ousels. 



