Class II. COMMON PIGEON. 389 



had obtained it.* And, at the siege of Modena, 

 Hirtius without, and Brutus within the walls, 

 kept, by the help of pigeons, a constant corre- 

 spondence ; baffling every stratagem of the be- 

 sieger Antony, "\ to intercept their couriers. In 

 the times of the Crusades, there are many more 

 instances of these birds of peace being employ- 

 ed in the service of war : Joinville relates one 

 during the crusade of Saint Louis ; J and Tasso 

 another, during the siege of Jerusalem.^ 



The nature of pigeons is to be gregarious ; 

 to lay only two eggs ; to breed many times in 

 the year ;|| to bill in their courtship ; for the 

 male and female to sit by turns, and also to 

 feed their young ; to cast their provision out of 

 their craw into the young ones' mouths ; to 

 drink, not like other birds by sipping, but by 

 continual draughts like quadrupeds ; and to 

 have notes mournful, or plaintive, 



* Milan var. hist. lib. ix. 2. Pliny, lib. x. c. 24. says, that 

 swallows have been made use of for the same purpose. 



•f Pliny, lib. x. c. 37. Exclames, Quid vallum et vigil ob- 

 sidio atque etiam retia amne preteuta profuere Antonio, per cae- 

 lum eunte nuncio ? 



X" 'Joinville, 638. app. 35. 



§ Tasso, book xviii. 



|| So quick is their produce, that the author of the Oeconomy 

 of nature observes, that in the space of four years, 14,760 may 

 -come from a single pair. Stilling fleet '$ tracts, 75. 



