142 TERMS SPLENDID CALCULATIONS. 



age of six months, when properly managed : their 

 courtship, and the well known tone of voice in the 

 cock, just then acquired and commencing, are indi- 

 cations of their approaching union. Nestlings, 

 whilst fed by the cock and hen, are termed SQUABS, 

 and are at that age sold and used for the table. 

 The dove-house pigeon is said to breed monthly, 

 being well supplied with food, more particularly 

 when the ground is bound by frost, or covered with 

 snow. At any rate, it may be depended on, that 

 pigeons of almost any healthy and well established 

 variety, will breed eight or ten times in the year ; 

 whence it may be conceived, how immense are the 

 quantities which may be raised. 



It is, nevertheless, with difficulty that one can 

 give entire credit to the calculations in such re- 

 spect, on pigeons and rabbits ; bringing to re- 

 membrance, to compare small things with great, 

 the earths of gold, of the celebrated Doctor 

 Price, which have been so greatly reduced in num- 

 ber and weight by subsequent doctors. But I sup- 

 pose we must not question the positive testimony 

 of Stillingfleet, who asserts, that fourteen thousand 

 seven hundred and sixty pigeons were produced from 

 one single pair, in the course of four years. To 

 class things of similar bearing together, it has been 

 calculated, but I know not by whom, or on what 

 practical ground, that a single pair of RABBITS 

 may, in the same portion of time, namely, four 

 years, produce one million two hundred and seventy 

 four thousand, eight hundred and forty of their 

 kind. 



The first step towards PIGEON KEEPING, is, un- 



