290 COLUMBINE. 



Pigeons are considered holy by some of the castes in 

 India. 



The notes of this Dove may be heard almost incessantly 

 through the months of March and April in most of our 

 thick woods and plantations, particularly those of closely- 

 set firs, in which they delight to build ; the nest consists 

 of a few sticks laid across, constituting a platform surface, 

 but so thin in substance that the eggs or young may some- 

 times be distinguished. This structure is usually sixteen 

 or twenty feet above the ground, and sufficiently broad to 

 afford room for both parents and their young. Two eggs 

 are laid, which are oval and white, measuring one inch 

 eight lines in length, by one inch two lines in breadth ; 

 these are hatched in sixteen or seventeen days ; the young 

 are nourished with food supplied from the crops of the 

 parent birds, who, opening their own beak, admit the man- 

 dibles of the young bird, and thus feed them with a soft 

 and pulpy mass which is already half digested. The old 

 birds produce two and sometimes three broods in the 

 season ; and it is a practice among boys, in some countries, 

 when they find a pair of newly -hatched birds, too young 

 and small for a prize, to tie each bird by one leg to a 

 branch under the nest, passing the string through the 

 bottom of the nest, and thus endeavour to insure the 

 capture at a future day. The old birds feed during spring 

 and summer on green corn, young clover, grain of all sorts, 

 with peas in particular, and during autumn and winter on 

 acorns, beech-nuts, berries, and turnip leaves. In cold 

 weather they fly in flocks, roosting at night on high trees 

 of ash and oak in thick woods. Ring Doves are in consi- 

 derable estimation as an article of food, and one of the 

 best modes of obtaining a shot at them is to be in waiting 

 under the trees upon which they come to roost. Ring 

 Doves, like the Pigeons in general, are birds of great power 



