THE PIGEON 133 



birds of prey it has been willing to forget so com- 

 pletely the rocks where it first nested that to-day one 

 seldom finds, at least in our country, any wild pairs. 



* * Not all our pigeons, however, show the same de- 

 gree of tameness ; far from it. Some, voluntary cap- 

 tives rather than real prisoners, are faithful to the 

 pigeon-house only as long as they find suitable food 

 in the neighboring fields, whither they go in flocks. 

 If the house is not to their liking, or if food is lack- 

 ing, they seek another abode, the more adventur- 

 ous sometimes even returning to the wild life. The 

 others, thoroughly enslaved, have completely lost 

 their desire for independence. Seldom do they leave 

 their roof, and some are such stay-at-homes that the 

 most pressing hunger could not make them go out 

 and try to find a little food for themselves in the 

 neighboring furrows. Food must always be given 

 them, for they are incapable of procuring it them- 

 selves. 



" Those first mentioned, the pigeons that venture 

 afield and find food for themselves, are called rock- 

 pigeons, after the wild pigeon whose ways, and fre- 

 quently whose plumage, they have retained in part. 

 They are also known as flighty pigeons (fuyards), 

 either on account of their occasional distant expedi- 

 tions, or because they sometimes take flight from the 

 pigeon-house and never return. They are the least 

 costly to raise, but they are small and not very pro- 

 ductive, as they lay only two or three times a year. 

 The second kind, those that scarcely ever leave the 

 pigeon-cote and cannot do without our care, are 



