creatures is in the country sufficient almost to pay for their food. In your garden you will find it the richest and most exciting of manures for your beds of leeks or onions, and to mix with earth for growing fancy flowers, as auriculas, carnations, &c."

Mr. Olive, watchmaker in this town, purchased a few days ago, from a captain of a vessel, two fowls brought from Bessarrabia;-the head of the male bird is ornamented with two long and crooked horny excrescences growing from the substance of the comb. The novelty of this very old physiological experiment is the successful growth of the two engrafted spurs. In the Journal Economique, Mars 1761, a writer says," the spur gradually strikes root into the flesh, and often grows more luxuriantly than it would in its natural place. Some have attained three inches in length and more than three lines and a half in diameter at the base. Sometimes they are twisted like the horns of a ram, at other times bent backwards like those of a hegoat."

Genus MELEAGRIS, Linn.

Turkey.-Head small; bill short, strong, convex, base covered with a naked skin; head and upper part of neck surrounded with a naked carunculated skin; throat with a pendulous wattle; a loose caruncle on the upper part of bill; a tuft of long black hair on the breast; coverts of tail short, stiff; tarsi (male) with an obtuse weak spur.

The female lays from fifteen to twenty eggs; period of incubation thirty-one days.

"No man who understands good living will say 'on such a day will I eat that turkey,' but let him hang it up by four of the large tail feathers, and when, on paying his morning visit to the larder, he finds it lying upon a cloth, prepared to receive it when it falls, that day let it be cooked."

The turkey was introduced into this country from North America, in the year 1524, in the reign of Henry 8th.

Genus NUMIDA, Linn.

Guinea Fowl.-Head small, bare, horned; bill strong, short, base covered with a naked warty skin, in which are the nostrils; wattles pendulous, carunculated (wattles in the male rather large, bluish-red, in the female small, red;-the male has a more stately strut); neck compressed, coloured, bare of feathers; tarsi without spurs; tail short, bent down; plumage bluish-grey spotted with white.

The female commences to lay in May, and continues throughout the summer; the period of incubation is thirty days.

A native of Africa, but the period of introduction into England is unknown; although Kennet says, "it was well known in England in the year 1277."

M. Doyle observes:—“They are bountiful producers of eggs—everlasting layers; small though their eggs be, they are worth keeping to a much greater extent than they are now reared. Of all our birds they are the most prolific of eggs; even the process of moulting is sometimes insufficient to draw off the nutriment the creature takes to make feathers instead of eggs, and the poor thing will sometimes go about half-naked in the chilly autumnal months, like a fowl that has escaped from the cook to avoid the preparation for the spit, unable to refrain from its diurnal visit to the nest, and consequently unable to furnish itself with a new great coat. As the body of a good cow is a distillery for converting all sorts of herbage into milk, and nothing else, or as little else as possible, so the body of the guinea hen is a most admirable machine for producing eggs out of insects, vegetables, grain, garbage, or whatever an omnivorous creature can lay hold of."

Genus PAVO, Linn.

Peacock.-Head small, crested; bill convex, strong; cheeks partially naked; nostrils large, open; tail feathers (18) elongated, broad, ocellated; tarsus with a conical spur. The female lays from five to six eggs; the period of incubation is from twenty-seven to thirty days.

A native of India, but has been domesticated in Europe for many ages. Roberts states,-" Peacocks are exceedingly numerous in the East; and it gives a kind of enchantment to a morning scene to see flocks of them together, spreading their beautiful plumage in the rays of the sun. They proudly stalk along, and then run with great speed, particularly if they get sight of a serpent; and the reptile must wind along in its best style, or he will soon become the prey of the lordly bird. A husband sometimes says to his wife, 'Come hither, my beautiful peacock.''

"The king (Soloman) had at sea a navy of Tharshish with the navy of Hiram once in three years came the navy of Tharshish, bringing gold and silver, ivory, and apes, and peacocks."-1 Kings, x. 22. (992 years B.C.)

"Its cry is so very harsh and disagreeable, that it is said to have the head of a serpent, the train of an angel, and the voice of a devil."-Calmet.

Domestic Pigeons, in Falmouth and neighbourhood.

By W. P. COCKS, Esq.

1854.

"And it came to pass, at the end of forty days, that Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made: And he sent forth a raven, which went forth to and fro, until the waters were dried up from off the earth. Also he sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters were abated from off the face of the ground: But the dove found no rest for the sole of her foot, and she returned unto him into the ark; for the waters were upon the face of the whole earth. Then he put forth his hand, and took her, and pulled her in unto him into the ark. And he stayed yet other seven days, and again he sent forth the dove out of the ark: And the dove came in to him in the evening, and, lo, in her mouth was an oliveleaf, pluckt off. So Noah knew that the waters were abated from off the earth. And he stayed yet other seven days, and sent forth the dove, which returned not again unto him any more."-Genesis.

PIGEONS.

Bill rather short, straight, compressed, arched, tip curved; base of upper mandible covered with a soft tumid bare substance : nostrils linear, in the lower and fore part of the membrane: legs short, strong; three toes before, free, one behind, articulated on the heel, generally red: wings with the second pinion-feather longest; tail-feathers twelve: colour of plumage various.

Sir J. G. Wilkinson says," The Arabs have an amusing legend respecting the Dove or Pigeon.

"The first time, it returned with the olive-branch, but without any indication of the state of the Earth itself; but on the second visit to the ark the red appearance of its feet proved that the red mud on which it had walked was already freed the waters; and to record the event, Noah prayed that the feet of these birds might for ever continue of that colour, which marks them to the present day."

The female lays but two eggs, which are incubated by both sexes; the male relieving his mate when she is compelled to quit the nest in search of food. The period is commonly eighteen days, sometimes only seventeen, especially in summer, and nineteen or twenty in winter.

Buffon observes,-" The attachment of the female to her eggs is so ardent and steady, that she will forego every comfort and submit to the most cruel hardships, rather than forsake them. A hen pigeon, whose toes froze and dropt off, persisted to sit till her young were hatched: her toes were frostbitten, because her hole chanced to be close to the window of the dove-cot.

The young are fed by the parent birds with food from their crop. "During incubation, the coats of the crop in the pigeon are gradually enlarged and thickened, like what happens to the udder of females of the Class Mammalia, during the term of gestation. On comparing the state of the crop when the bird is not sitting with its appearance during incubation, the difference is remarkable. In the first case it is thin and membraneous, but by the time the young are about to be hatched, the whole, except what lies on the windpipe, becomes thickened and takes a glandular appearance, having its internal surface very irregular. It is likewise more vascular than in its former state, that it may convey a quantity of blood sufficient for the secretion of this substance, which is to nourish the young brood for some days after they are hatched. Whatever may be the consistence of this substance, when just secreted, it most probably soon coagulates into a granulated white curd; for in such a form I have found it in the crop, and if an old pigeon is killed just as the young ones are hatching, the crop will be found as above described, and in its cavity pieces of curd mixed with some of the common food of the pigeon, such as barley, beans, &c. If we allow either of the parents to feed the young, its crop, when examined, will be discovered to contain the same curdled substance, which passes thence into the stomach, where it is to be digested. The young pigeon is fed for some time with this substance only, and about the third day some of the com

mon food is found mingled with it; as the pigeon grows older the proportion of common food is increased, so that by the time it is seven, eight, or nine days old, the secretion of card ceases in the old ones, and, of course, no more will be found in the crop of the young. It is a curious fact, that the parent pigeon has at first the power to throw up this curd, without any mixture of common food, though afterwards both are thrown up according to the proportion required for the young ones."-John Hunter.

M. Biberg observes, that "if you suppose two pigeons to hatch nine times a year, they may produce in four years 14,760 young."

M. M'Cullock states," There are great numbers of these birds (pigeons) in England. A dove-cot is reckoned an indispensable adjunct to a country gentleman's residence, and in many countries it is customary for farmers to keep a few pairs. They are occasionally reared in the view of supplying the market, but for the most they are kept as articles of luxury. They are very voracious, and destroy great quantities of grain. There are some rather curious speculations on this subject in Vancouver's Survey of Devon. He supposes that there are in all 20,000 pigeon-houses and 1,125,000 pairs of dove-house pigeons in England and Wales, and that they consume 157,500,000 pints, or 4,921,875 Winchester bushels of grain a year." In two specimens (Rock doves) examined by Professor Macgillivray, the number of seeds of grain found were, in one, over 1,000, and in the other 510.

"A common house-pigeon shot in a wheat-field in the neighbourhood of Dumfries had taken from his crop no less than 500 grains of newly-sown wheat.-Lloyds Weekly London News, Dec. 17th, 1854.

As food for man the pigeon is wholesome, very nutritious, and rich in flavour.

"The pigeon is also noticed as a favourite food of the Egyptians; and so pure and wholesome was it considered by them, that when the country was visited by epidemic diseases, and all things were affected by the pestilential state of the atmosphere, they believed that those alone who contented themselves with it were safe from the infection. Indeed, during that period, no other food was placed upon the tables of the kings and priests, whose duty it was to keep themselves pure for the service of the gods."-Sir J. G. Wilkinson. Our Lord one day entered the Temple, and with a scourge of cords drove out those who there traded in pigeons.

Law for the protection of Pigeons.-An Act passed in the of James I. enacts :-"That all and every person and

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