Clearing 221 



half shudder. Notwithstanding, they were 

 swifter than the wind and as tireless. The 

 feeding grounds lay hundreds of miles away, 

 yet the flocks went out to them at morning 

 and came back from them at night. 



The going was like the moving of an army. 

 Flock after flock rose separately, poised itself 

 and skimmed away, one flock always waiting 

 until another was clear of the roost. Males 

 and females flew and roosted apart. Male 

 flocks flew highest in the air. There were 

 feeding grounds both sides of the roost. The 

 flocks flew north or south according to the wind, 

 choosing always to go as near down wind as 

 they could. Thus it happened people living 

 north or south of the roost often did not see a 

 flying pigeon for days — then all at once found 

 the sky dark and thick with them, coming or 

 going, from the earliest dawn to long after 

 dark. A flock never came home until it was 

 full fed — consequently those going out late, 

 or lighting upon ground already stripped, some- 

 times flew into the roost about midnight. Some 

 few hundred sluggard stragglers, and lame or 

 wounded birds, fed in the woods and fields 

 close about the roost, going out in half dozens, 

 but flying even then in the common wavering 

 line. 



At night the pigeon-roost was a sight to see. 

 It stretched several miles — all along the hills 



