156 WOOD 



any other; and with respect to the individual in question, 

 my firm impression is, that had I stayed at home until the 

 breeding-season, at the arrival of which time he might 

 probably have left me; but even then I should have expected 

 him to pay me frequent visits for food, and most likely to 

 have nested in the immediate vicinity of the house. 



It is well known that few birds are wilder and more 

 distrustful than the Ring Dove in autumn and winter; but 

 that at the approach of spring they throw off much of their 

 wildness, and become comparatively familiar and confiding; 

 and it appears to me somewhat remarkable that the strongest 

 case of this change of their habits I ever heard of, has since 

 occurred in the garden about which my tame Dove spent his 

 time. A pair of these birds nested in a shrub about twenty 

 yards from the front of the house. Under the shrub was placed 

 a garden chair, which was usually occupied several hours in 

 the day. Beading aloud was frequently resorted to by the 

 parties occupying the chair; and three or four children were 

 pursuing their sports all round, and, like all other children, 

 did not always pursue them in 'solemn silence.' But this 

 was not all. The nest was not six feet from the ground, and 

 visitors were often introduced to the sitting bird, who, 

 seeming to care nothing for the close approximation of 

 human eyes to her own, sat on in spite of all, and in due 

 time hatched. This regardlessness of the eye of man has 

 always seemed to me very strange. Look steadfastly at your 

 favourite dog, and he turns away his eye in apparent uneasiness, 

 and will not look at you, even though you call him, while 

 he suspects you are still gazing at him. The wild-fowl 

 shooter will tell you to be careful not to look at the 

 approaching flight of Wild Ducks, for they will 'see your 

 eye' and turn another way. Walk under the tree in your 

 garden, where the Biug Dove is sitting, take no notice of 

 her, and she will take none of you: come back again and 

 look steadfastly at her as you pass, and in nineteen cases 

 out of twenty she will fly off. Yet in the case I am des- 

 cribing, the visitor's eye was often not more than two feet 

 from the bird, and unless it was long fixed on her, she never 

 moved. During the time of incubation, the male, or that 

 bird which was not sitting, for I believe the male relieves 

 the female for a space of seven or eight hours every day 

 the Domestic Pigeon certainly does was generally to be 

 seen sitting in an ash tree at the bottom of the garden. A 



