STRAYING SOFT MEAT. 165 



dent; and that which is unaccountable is, although 

 they will find their home from such great distances, 

 they nevertheless often lose themselves in their own 

 neighbourhood. Should a cock or hen be lost during 

 incubation, the eggs will be spoiled in twenty or 

 thirty hours, and may then be taken from the nest ; 

 but, if the accident happen after hatching, the single 

 parent left will feed the young. Should both parents 

 be lost, the young are very easily accustomed to be 

 fed by hand with small peas or tares, much prefer- 

 able to barley. We did not find any necessity for 

 recourse to the old housewife's instrument, the hollow 

 reed. 



SOFT MEAT is a sort of milky fluid or pap secreted 

 in the craw of pigeons, by the wise providence of 

 nature, against the time when it will be wanted for 

 the nourishment of their young. In all probability, 

 from instinct, the pigeons eat a greater quantity at 

 this time, and the grain goes through a certain pro- 

 cess in their crops, which produces the soft meat or 

 pap in question. This they have the power of throw- 

 ing up at will; and, in feeding, they eject it from 

 their own bills into those of the young ones, the bills 

 of which are taken into their own. This kind of 

 feeding continues six or seven days, when the old 

 ones begin to mix some harder food with it, until, 

 at length, they feed with whole grain. When the 

 time approaches for the hen to lay, the cock is often 

 seen driving her from place to place, not suffering 

 her to rest any where but in her nest, apparently 

 from an instinctive apprehension that she may drop 

 her egg in an improper place. 



