220 PIGEONS. 



stand in one place, where fresh birds will continue 

 dropping into the boughs, till you have half filled 

 your bag with them. Observe one thing, however, 

 or you may not kill a bird in a week ! Recollect 

 that a woodpigeon, directly he perches, begins to re- 

 connoitre his safety in every direction; and if you 

 move but a finger, when he first alights, he will 

 instantly take wing. But if you will only wait per- 

 fectly still for half a minute, you may then present 

 and fire at him as easily as at an owl. 



Although the ringdove or woodpigeon seldom 

 builds anywhere but in dark evergreen trees, such as 

 yew trees, firs, &c., yet, in 1824, one of these birds 

 entered a dovehouse of mine ; made her nest in com- 

 pany with the tame pigeons ; and hatched her eggs 

 there, notwithstanding a man was repeatedly going 

 in to clean out the place, and take young pigeons. 

 Here she brought up her two young ones, and then 

 took them off with her. This is almost as singular 

 as the circumstance of a partridge, in 1788, having 

 reared sixteen young ones up in a pollard tree, 

 through which went the bars of the stile in a public 

 foot-path. This happened in Essex, on a manor of 

 my late father, of whom Mr. Daniel had the deputa- 

 tion, and was an eyewitness to the circumstance. 

 The particulars of this he very correctly states in 

 his " Rural Sports." 



