174 
NATURE NOTES 
thing but his own wild desire to move on. Two or three times 
he hesitated for the tenth of a second when he came to a trunk 
— did not seem quite sure whether he wanted to go up or down ; 
but on each occasion he decided to go up, then along a branch 
at a higher level, and from this he always leapt to the next tree. 
I saw him disappear at last — after visiting about a dozen trees 
in four or five minutes — down a distant trunk. Once before, 
when I thought I had lost him, suddenly, behind some rather 
heavy foliage, I saw a moving figure pass from behind a fir 
trunk to the very end of a long branch, and then to my surprise 
wheel round towards me, and perch on another tree nearer the 
path. It was a wood pigeon ; but while gliding gently through 
the air, and partly hidden by foliage, I had mistaken it for my 
little bird without wings. Cowper was right, as he generally 
is, when he drew attention to the bird-like movements of the 
squirrel.” 
September 12, 1901. An Early Bird. 
NOTES ON THE BARBARY DOVE, COLLARED 
TURTLE DOVE, OR LAUGHING DOVE (TUR- 
TUR RISORIUS). 
OR many years we have had a few of these common 
I but attractive birds here about the garden. They 
I have perfect liberty, and usually keep close to the 
house, often sitting on the porch and window-sills. 
If the doors and windows are left open they walk in. Wounded 
or sickly birds and late hatched young ones are sometimes put 
into a large outdoor cage, and tended till strong enough to let 
out, but the rest are fairly hardy, and being well fed twice a day 
can easily stand the cold of an average east coast winter. Some 
of these doves have a provoking habit of disappearing now and 
then for an indefinite period, perhaps never to return ; or, on the 
other hand, they may suddenly reappear months afterwards, in 
company with a strange dove or two, so that their numbers are 
apt to fluctuate a good deal. So many of these birds are kept 
by cottagers and others (generally caged) in this neighbourhood, 
that those at liberty, hearing the distant cooing of their own 
species, are probably tempted to stray from home, and are then 
perhaps caught and caged. This tendency to stray away, and 
perhaps return again after a time in increased or diminished 
numbers, has been observed in several instances at houses where 
these doves are kept at large. My brother, living about two 
miles from here, generally has some about his house and garden, 
and the familiar coo of this bird is sometimes heard coming from 
trees growing in the meadows about midway between the two 
houses. 
