54 COLUBIBIDE. 



to take place ; and the pair, when once united, remain con- 

 stant to each other for life. 



The nest of the Rock Dove is a very flat and loose struc- 

 ture, or heap of stalks and small sticks, on which the female 

 deposits generally two white eggs, and sits from sixteen to 

 eighteen days upon them, alternately with the male, before 

 the young, which are ugly and blind, appear. Every night 

 the male bird sits on the edge of the nest, or very near to it, 

 for the purpose of guarding his mate from danger, and from 

 the intrusion of her neighbours. The young birds leave the 

 nest in about four weeks from the time of hatching, and are 

 fed for some time by the parent birds with half-digested food 

 out of their crops. Soon after the young birds can fly they 

 learn to take care of themselves, and they keep up their 

 piping note for a length of time after they have left the nest. 



That pigeons have been domesticated for many ages is 

 a well known fact, inasmuch as the Jews slaughtered great 

 numbers of them in the Temple at Jerusalem, and feasted 

 upon them. On the Mount of Olives was a spot called the 

 Pigeon Rock, on which stood a pigeon-house, where upwards 

 of five thousand birds were kept. The simile used by Isaiah, 

 also, (lx. 8,) describing the return of the Israelites to their 

 own land, appears to refer to domesticated pigeons. He says, 

 " Who are these that fly as a cloud, and as the doves to their 

 windows ? " 



The Rock Dove measures, from the tip of the beak to the 

 extremity of the tail, from thirteen inches to thirteen inches 

 and a half; the wing, from the carpus to the tip, nine inches 

 and a half; and the tail, about four inches and a half. The 

 beak, which is black, measures nine lines and a half ; and, 

 from being very much compressed about the middle, both 

 in height and width, it causes the tip to appear swollen. 

 About the root of the upper mandible is a fleshy substance, 

 having the appearance of dough ; and the nostril is a long 

 oval slit. 



