82 PIGEONS AND TROPIC BIPDS. [169I. 



Capons ; they are more familiar, and more easily to be canglit 

 than Wooclhens. 



The Pigeons'^ here are somewhat less than ours, and all of 

 a Slate colour, fat and good. They pearch and build their 

 Nests upon Trees; they are easily taken, being so Tame, that 

 we have had fifty about our Table to Pick up the Melon- 

 Seeds which we threw them, and they lik'd mightily. We 

 took them when we pleas'd, and ty'd little Rags to their 

 Thighs of several Colours, that we might know them again if 

 we let them loose. They never miss'd attending us at our 

 Meals, and we call'd them our Chickens. They never built 

 their Nests in the Isle, but in the little Islets^ that are 

 near it. AVe suppos'd 'twas to avoid the persecution of 

 the Rats, of which there are vast Numbers in this Island, 

 as I shall report in the Sequel of this Relation. The 

 Rats never pass into the Islets. The Fools,^ the Frigats* 

 and perhaps some other Sea-Birds who live upon Fish only, 

 build their Nests on Trees ; but^ there are some other 



" of much more cursorial habits", write Messrs. Giinther and Newton, 

 " than its congeners, chasing rather terrestrial animals (lizards) than 

 aquatic.'' {Phil. Trans., I. c, 436.) 



"The effect of the prolonged isolation on the two vertebrate-hunt- 

 ing birds of Rodriguez, the owl and the night-heron, was precisely the 

 same. Without losing the power of flight, they became brevipennate ; but 

 the increased development of the legs compensated for the reduction of 

 this power, and enabled the one to destroy animals of larger size when 

 the smaller kinds become scarcer, and the other to chase its swift - 

 running prey." {Pli'dosophical Transactions, op. c, p. 436.) 



1 Columha rodericana. This pigeon, now extinct, was probably of 

 the genus Erytlircena, being of a slate colour {anloise), and not the 

 Turtur picturatus of Madagascar, Reunion, and Mauritius, as suggested 

 by M. Milne Edwards. {E. N.) 



2 These islets all received names subsequently. See p. 86, infra, and 

 a later account of Rodriguez (1730), Ann. des Sc nat. Zool. (6), ii, art. 4. 



3 The "Booby", probably Sula piscator, a species of gaunet. ; but cf. 

 Alph. Milne Edwards, in Ann. des Sc. nat. Zool, 6me serie, t. ii, art. 4, 



4 " Les Paille-en-queue," omitted in translation. See next page. 



5 In orig : " les ferrets et quelques autres." These birds are de- 

 scribed later, in Part II. 



