274 PIGEONS. 



numbers. Indeed, had they not been far more numerous than 

 they are at present, it would not have been worth while to 

 have adopted the expensive mode of catching them, which we 

 believe is at present entirely given up, though till within a 

 few years it was practised near Cava, on the Gulf of Sorento, 

 in Italy, where, upon the tops of some bushy hills, were 

 erected small circular towers : on each of these, towards the 

 latter end of September, a man posted himself, and as soon as 

 a flight of Pigeons passed on their way through the valley, he 

 flung a flat stone over them, which, by its form or manner of 

 throwing, made a sort of whistling noise, which frightened the 

 birds, and hastened their flight towards a place of refuge. 

 Another was thrown from each tower as they passed, until the 

 affrighted flock was thus driven to the last turret in the valley, 

 where a large net was spread in the hollows amongst the bushes, 

 in which the birds were taken. Great art was requisite in throw- 

 ing the stone, as upon this the success of the diversion depended. 

 At a small village called Gerde, about a league from Bag- 

 nere de Bigorres, in the Pyrenees, a mode somewhat similar 

 is adopted from the middle of September to the middle of 

 November, which attracts the notice, and is resorted to as a 

 favourite amusement, by those who visit that beautiful coun- 

 try. Large nets are stretched across the end of a narrow 

 valley, and made fast to trees. Three tall spars, nearly fifty 

 feet in height, are reared in a triangular form, meeting in a 

 point at the summit, where a sort of nest of bushes is made, 

 in which a person conceals himself, ascending the high poles 

 by small pegs, which, as they shake under his weight, and 

 are as slender as possible, consistently with strength, appears 

 to lookers-on to be a service of no small risk. Two men are 

 also concealed in bushes near the nets, which by means of 

 lines, they are enabled to throw over the Pigeons, as they 

 advance ; while others, assembled on the heights immediately 

 abcve, frighten the birds and force them to fly downwards as 

 they pass through the channel of the valley. When all have 

 taken their positions, they wait patiently and silently the 

 arrival of a flock of Pigeons. Their approach is announced 

 by a rushing sound, on hearing which the people on the 



