Chap. VI. THEIR PARENTAGE. 195 



variety of 0. livia ; but I have seen dovecots brought from Yorkshire 

 without any trace of chequering, like the wild rock-pigeon of the 

 Shetland Islands, The chequered dovecots from the Orkney Islands, 

 after having been domesticated by Colonel King for more than 

 twenty years, differed slightly from each other in the darkness of 

 their plumage and in the thickness of their beaks ; the thinnest beak 

 being rather thicker than the thickest one in the Madeira birds. In 

 Germany, according to Bechstein, the common dovecot- pigeon is not 

 chequered. In India they often become chequered, and sometimes 

 pied with white ; the croup also, as I am informed by Mr. Bly th ; 

 becomes nearly white. I have received from Sir. J. Brooke some 

 dovecot-pigeons, which originally came from the S. Natunas Islands 

 in the Malay Archipelago, and which had been crossed with the 

 Singapore dovecots : they were small and the darkest variety was 

 extremely like the dark chequered variety with a blue croup from 

 Madeira ; but the beak was not so thin, though decidedly thinner 

 than in the rock-pigeon from the Shetland Islands. A dovecot- 

 pigeon sent to me by Mr. Swinhoe from Foochow, in China, was 

 likewise rather small, but differed in no other respect. I have 

 also received through the kindness of Dr. Daniell, four living dovecot- 

 pigeons from Sierra Leone, 17 these were fully as large as the 

 Shetland rock-pigeon, with even bulkier bodies. In plumage some 

 of them were identical with the Shetland rock pigeon, but with the 

 metallic tints apparently rather more brilliant ; others had a blue 

 croup, and resembled the chequered variety of C. intermedia of 

 India ; and some were so much chequered as to be nearly black. 

 ]n these four birds the beak differed slightly in length, but in all it 

 was decidedly shorter, more massive, and stronger than in the wild 

 rock-pigeon from the Shetland Islands, or in the English dovecot. 

 When the beaks of these African pigeons were compared with the 

 thinnest beaks of the wild Madeira specimens, the contrast was great ; 

 the former being fully one-third thicker in a vertical direction 

 than the latter ; so that any one at first would have felt inclined to 

 rank these birds as specifically distinct ; yet so perfectly graduated a 

 series could be formed between the above-mentioned varieties, that 

 it was obviously impossible to separate them. 



To sum up : the wild Columba livia, including nnder this 

 name C. affinis, intermedia, and the other still more closety- 

 affinecl geographical races, has avast range from the southern 

 coast of Norway and the Faroe Islands to the shores of the 

 Mediterranean, to Madeira and the Canary Islands, to Abys- 

 sinia, India, and Japan. It varies greatly in plumage, being 



17 Domestic pigeons of the common published in 1746; they are said, in 



kind are mentioned as being pretty accordance with the name which they 



numerous in John Barbut's ' Descrip- bear, to have been imported, 

 tion of the Coast cf Guinea ' (p. 215), 



