THE PET PIGEON.
When I was about nine years old, my father and mother were living in a Southern city; and, as I had been very ill for a long time, I was taken from school, and permitted to do as I liked.
In one of my walks I met an old colored woman, who took quite a fancy to me; and once, when I was sick at home, she came to see me, bringing as a present a young pigeon. Its feathers were not grown enough to show its color; but it proved to be brown and white.
I was very much grieved when my mother said that she could not have a pigeon kept in the house; but my father persuaded her to indulge me till I was able to go out again; and then my pet gave so little trouble that nobody objected to him.
For the first two or three weeks, he was put at night in another room; but I begged so hard that finally "Pidgy," as I called him, was allowed to roost on top of the wardrobe in my bed-room.
The first time he saw me asleep, he seemed very much alarmed (so my mother told me); but he settled down on my shoulder, and kept very quiet till I awoke. This he always did after that morning, sometimes waiting more than two hours. After amusing myself with him till it was time to get up, I used to give him a large basin of water, into which he would jump with great delight; and he would be making his toilet while I was making mine.
For two or three months I kept his wings clipped, so that he could not fly far. When I went out for a walk, I generally took him, either in my arms or perched on my hand; and thus I and my pet became known all over the neighborhood; and, when my little playmates invited me to visit them, an invitation was always sent for "Lillie and her pigeon."