388 THE AMERICAN PASSENGER PIGEON. 



his back to the wind, the wind would blow his feathers 

 about. Therefore, so far as we can express an opinion, 

 our experience is, that all birds perch or float upon 

 water, facing the wind, when it blows strongly. Their 

 heads are then turned in for shelter during sleep beneath 

 the wing. As regards the advantage of good decoys, in 

 many kinds of bird shooting, there can be no question,, 

 where they can be fixed in a natural attitude. This is well 

 seen in duck and goose shooting, and no doubt the same 

 plan would prove valuable to attract pigeons also. 



In Wilderness hunting the pigeon is a most useful 

 bird: in the first place wherever there are copses or 

 belts of timber along streams, it is found everywhere. 

 Pigeon shooting in Africa is capital. The following 

 for instance is extracted from a recent work on the 

 Congo Free State. " Good shooting can be had every 

 morning from April till October at the green pigeons,, 

 which collect in flocks of from 50 to 100 or more. 

 They are very plump and fat and excellent eating. 

 They are in my opinion, without doubt, the fastest 

 flying pigeons I have ever come across, and take good 

 shooting to make anything of a bag." * 



In the middle of great forests also, the pigeon is one 

 of the few birds which seem to make a home amid the 

 dense wilderness of trees (where they feed upon berries 

 and mast). Here they are always to be found in suffi- 

 cient numbers, and under circumstances which enable 

 the hunter to recruit his larder from their ranks. There 

 are of course doubtless many other birds, but their num- 

 bers are often apparently so few, and their habits such, 

 that it is difficult to make a bag of them. The marvellous 



* Travels, etc., in the Congo Free State, and its Big Game Shoot- 

 ing, by Bula N. Zau, 1894, p. 28 (written by Mr. Henry Bailey). 



