ORDER GALLING. 279 



to food, is wholesome to all animals, and an aid to digestion ; but 

 when it forms an intimate ingredient, and the aliment is satu- 

 rated with it, it produces an effect directly the reverse. In 

 the one case, it acts as a salutary stimulus on the organs of 

 taste and digestion; in the other, it exhausts the succulency of 

 the food, and renders it dry, hard, and improper for assimila- 

 tion. Thus, though salt is itself a most powerful antiseptic, 

 we find salted provisions eminently productive of scorbutic 

 diseases. The birds, therefore, of which we are speaking, 

 should receive their salt, much in the same way as we gene- 

 rally take it ourselves, in moderate quantity, — not mixed with 

 their food, but placed for them to help themselves when they 

 think proper. 



From this fondness for salt, and the dry quality of their 

 food in general, pigeons are great drinkers. Water should be 

 abundantly supplied for them, and attention paid to its quali- 

 ties of sweetness and purity. River water is the best for them. 

 Spring water, which is always more or less impregnated with 

 earthy salts, is by no means so proper for these birds. It is 

 remarkable enough that they may be brought to drink warm 

 water, and even sometimes at a very high degree of tempera- 

 ture. It is imagined, that in some cases, this, as well as 

 warm bathing, is advantageous to them. Mineral waters have 

 also been administered to them, with good effect in many 

 cases. 



The sense of sight is very perfect in these birds. Sur- 

 rounded as they usually are by dangers, and unprovided with 

 the weapons either of attack or defence, they would be con- 

 stantly open to the attack of rapacious birds, if nature had 

 not bestowed on them such powers of vision. Their eyes also 

 possess wonderful mobility, and can be directed every way, 

 according to the will of the animal. Besides this, the quick- 

 ness with which this bird can assume all attitudes, assists 

 wonderfully the operations of the powers of vision. It has 



