When they thus
rendezvoused here by thousands, if they happened to be suddenly
roused from their roost-trees on an evening,
Their rising all at once was like the sound
Of thunder heard remote....
(* Some old sportsmen say that the main part of these flocks used
to withdraw as soon as the heavy Christmas frosts were over.)
It will by no means be foreign to the present purpose to add, that I
had a relation in this neighbourhood who made it a practice for a
time, whenever he could procure the eggs of a ring-dove, to place
them under a pair of doves that were sitting in his own pigeon-
house; hoping thereby, if he could bring about a coalition, to
enlarge his breed, and teach his own doves to beat out into the
woods and to support themselves by mast: the plan was plausible,
but something always interrupted the success; for though the birds
were usually hatched, and sometimes grew to half their size, yet
none ever arrived at maturity. I myself have seen these foundlings
in their nest displaying a strange ferocity of nature, so as scarcely
to bear to be looked at, and snapping with their bills by way of
menace.
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