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first received it ate a good deal of dry crumbled biscuit, but takes

very little of it now.


The bird has never ailed since it has been with me, and,

considering that it is not fully clothed and cannot take much

exercise, is perhaps not more susceptible to cold than the

European Roller. They all revel in the sun, and dislike our

dull cheerless November weather.


I cannot make up my mind as to the sex ; but the face

and bill seem feminine.


Doubtless the food in its wild state is practically the same

as that of the European Roller.


I should suppose that a good specimen of the Indian

Roller in its native sun would be a glorious creature.


Habitat .—“ From Asia Minor to Persia and N. Arabia,

thence to Baluchistan. The whole of the Indian Peninsula and

Ceylon.”



NOTES ON MY DOVES IN 1898.


By O. E. Cressweee.


There may be some of our members to whom a few notes

may be of interest on some rare Pigeons and Doves, which I

have added to my collection during the past year ; and also upon

the breeding of one or two other species which are not rare.


In the month of April, I received from a kind corres¬

pondent in the West Indies some large crates, containing about

thirty inmates of the genus Columba. They travelled from the

Eondon docks through a bitterly cold night, and arrived on a

bitterly cold morning. I was from home, and my headman in

the aviaries found, with consternation, some lovely little Turtles

almost dead. They looked beyond power of feeding; but his

promptitude saved them all : in the warmth of a kitchen

they came round, and turned their attention to white millet ;

but I will presently go into fuller particulars about them. The

consignment as a whole was of interest from two points of

view—firstly, that, as far as I can discover, three of the species

have very rarely been imported ; secondly, because some of the

less rare species had been hand-reared from the nest, and are,

therefore, absolutely tame. The great drawback to the race is

its extreme timidity : consequently one specially appreciates

tame Doves. I will take them in order.


First, were six large and curious Wood Pigeons —

“ Ramyers ” they are called in Barbados—I presume a variation



