244 ON THE REARING AND MANAGEMENT 



and very delicate and cleanly in their diet ; they will 

 sometimes eat green aromatic vegetables, but are fondest 

 of seeds; and tares, and the smallest kind of horse- 

 beans, is the most suitable food both in point of eco- 

 nomy and fattening qualities. Pease, wheat, buck- 

 wheat, and even barley, oats, &c., are also eaten by 

 pigeons, but old tares may be reckoned their very best 

 food ; new tares, pease, or beans, are reckoned scour- 

 ing. Wherever pigeons are kept, the best way to keep 

 them chiefly at home, and thereby both prevent their 

 being lost, and their doing injury to corn-crops, is to 

 feed them well : this is also the only way in which, in 

 modern times, they will afford abundance of fat and 

 delicate squabs for the table, which, well fed, they will 

 do every month in the year, and thus afford a constant 

 supply of delicate stimulating food. Pigeons are gene- 

 rally fed in the open air adjoining their cote or house ; 

 but in inclement weather, or to attach new pigeons to 

 their home, both food and water should be given inter- 

 nally. That this may be done without waste, and 

 without frequently disturbing the birds, two contriv- 

 ances are in use ; the first is the meat-box or hopper, 

 from whence grain or pulse descends from the hopper, 

 as eaten out of a small shallow box ; the next is the 

 water-bottle, an ovate, long naked bottle, reversed in 



