244 ALLEN'S NATURALIST'S LIBRARY 



returning very early one morning with eight Wood-Pigeons in 

 his hands, and I asked him how he got them. ''At one shot," he 

 replied, " Mr. Mills told me that the Pigeons were working his 

 peas, and asked me to scare them if I could. So I went down to 

 Widbrook, and hid myself behind the hedge on the common. 

 After a long wait, I saw a bird walking among the peas and 

 fired at it. On going to pick it up, I found seven others had 

 been knocked over at the same time." Besides peas and grain 

 the Wood-Pigeons devour great quantities of beech-mast, and 

 I have more than once shot them from beech woods, when 

 their crops have been so full of mast, that they have actually 

 split open with their fall. 



At the present day one does not need to go to the woods 

 to study the habits of this pretty bird, for it is now a plentiful 

 inhabitant of the London parks. Years ago I have seen them 

 stalking about quite tamely in the Champs Elysees and the 

 gardens of the Luxembourg, in Paris, and now they are equally 

 tame in Kensington Gardens and St. James's Park, in London, 

 and one pair, at least, seems to have taken up their abode in 

 the grounds of the Natural History Museum, during the 

 present spring (1897). 



Nest. This is a poorly constructed platform of crossed twigs, 

 and is placed in all kinds of situations ; in low bushes, in high 

 trees, in thick ivy, and sometimes on the deserted nests of 

 other birds, or squirrels. When placed in a thorn-bush or 

 some such situation, the framework of the nest is so slight 

 that the white eggs can be seen through the twigs from below. 



Eggs. Two, exceptionally three, in number. Pure white, 

 and glossy. Axis, i'55-i'75 inches ; diam., I'^-i^. 



II. THE STOCK-DOVE. COLUMBA CENAS. 



Columba cenas (pL), Linn. Syst. Nat. i. p. 279 (1766); Macgill. 

 Brit. B. i. p. 287 (1837); Dresser, B. Eur. vii. p. 23, 

 pi. 458(1876); B. O. U. List Brit. B. p. 138 (1883); 

 Saunders, ed. Yarrell's Brit. B. iii. p. 8 (1883); Seebohm, 

 Hist. Brit. B. ii. p. 401 (1884); Saunders, Man. Brit. B. 

 p. 469 (1889); Lilford, Col. Fig. Brit. B. part xx. (1891); 

 Salvad. Cat. B. Brit. Mus. xxi. p. 261 (1893). 



(Plate CXXIl.) 



