This dove might probably be of the carrier-pigeon tribe, which is more nearly related to the rock-pigeon, also a native of this country, or rather, of the northern parts of Scotland. These carrier-pigeons were, in the old times, long enough before the invention of electric telegraphs, or even before post-offices were established, used instead of both. Anacreon, the Greek poet, speaks of them as being used to convey letters; the pigeon, having, as it were, two homes, being fed in each; thus, a letter from a friend in one home was tied to the wing, and the bird turned into the air, probably without his breakfast, when he immediately flew off to his distant home, where the letter was joyfully received, and he fed for his pains. Whilst the answer was prepared he would rest, and it, perhaps, taking some little time, he grew hungry again; but they gave him nothing more, and, again securing the letter on his little person, he was sent back, making good speed, because he would now be thinking of his supper. Thus, the answer flew through the air.
“Come hither, my dove,
And I’ll write to my love,
And I’ll send him a letter by thee!”
WOOD-PIGEONS AND NEST. [[Page 92.]
So says the old song. And we are told that a young man named Taurosthenes, one of the victors in the great Olympian games of Greece, sent to his father, who resided at a considerable distance, the tidings of his success, on the same day, by one of these birds. Pliny, the Roman historian, speaks of them being used in case of siege; when the besieged sent out these winged messengers, who, cleaving the air at a secure height above the surrounding army, conveyed the important intelligence of their need to their friends afar off. The crusaders are said to have made use of them at the siege of Jerusalem, and the old traveller, Sir John Maundeville—“knight, warrior, and pilgrim,” as he is styled—who, in the reign of our second and third Edwards, made a journey as far as the borders of China, relates that, “in that and other countries beyond, pigeons were sent out from one to another to ask succour in time of need, and these letters were tied to the neck of the bird.”
But enough of carrier-pigeons. Let us come back to our ring-dove or cushat, brooding on her eggs in the sweet summer woods, as Mr. Harrison Weir has so truthfully represented her. She is not much of a nest-maker.
“A few sticks across,
Without a bit of moss,