RARER BRITISH BIRDS. 31 



abound with the nutritious beech nut, which constitutes the 

 chief food of the Wild Pigeon. In seasons when these are 

 abundant, corresponding multitudes of Pigeons may be confi- 

 dently expected. It sometimes happens, that having consumed 

 the whole produce of the beech trees in an extensive district, 

 they discover another at the distance of perhaps sixty or eighty 

 miles, to which they regularly repair every morning, and return 

 as regularly, in the course of the day or in the evening, to their 

 place of general rendezvous, or, as it is generally called, the 

 roosting-place. These roosting-places are always in the woods, 

 and sometimes occupy a large extent of forest. When they have 

 frequented one of these places for some time, the appearance 

 it exhibits is surprising : the ground is covered to the depth 

 of several inches with their dung, all the tender grass and under- 

 wood destroyed, the surface strewed with large limbs of trees, 

 broken down by the weight of the birds clustering one above 

 another, and the trees themselves, for thousands of acres, killed 

 as completely as if girdled with an axe. The marks of this 

 desolation remain for many years on the spot, and numerous 

 places could be pointed out, where, for several years after, 

 scarce a single vegetable made its appearance. When these 

 roosts are first discovered, the inhabitants, from considerable 

 distances, visit them in the night, with guns, clubs, long poles, 

 pots of sulphur, and various other engines of destruction, and, 

 in a few hours, they fill many sacks and load their horses with 

 them. By the Indians, a Pigeon-roost, or breeding-place, is 

 considered an important source, of national profit, and de- 

 pendence for that season. 



From the extract above, some idea may be formed of the 

 immense size of the flights of the Migratory Pigeons ; no flight, 

 however, has ever been known to visit this country. Our 

 authority for introducing it into this work, as a member of the 

 British Fauna, rests upon a specimen mentioned by Dr. Fleming, 



