What human parents would think of wintering in, say, Cairo, if they knew that the railway companies meant to destroy them wholesale as they travelled down to Dover; that the coast-guard and along-shore rabble were all on the look-out for them to take their lives; that the Channel steamer owners were in conspiracy to kill them; that the quays at Calais were swarming with avowed murderers of British travellers; that every Continental line was run by bandits and brigands sworn to shed their blood, and every hotel and resting-place an ambush of assassins? What British pater-familias would "winter in Cairo" under such conditions of travel? Yet these are the conditions under which the nightingales come and go. Only they do not know it. If they did, "the instinct of self-preservation" would surely triumph over "love of country," and we should never see any nightingales in England, nor any turtle-doves--one of the most beautiful of our birds. But more of turtle-doves by-and-by.
"_The Ring-dove in the embowering ivy yet_ _Keeps up her love lament._" SHELLEY.
"_Summer hath spoken soothingly to each nested Finch._" KEATS.
Their larger and more beautiful relative the ring-dove or wood-pigeon we have with us always, and I think it is conspicuously the bird of June. The young are then on the wing, and it is impossible, passing near their haunts, not to be attracted by this ornamental bird, which, whether flying or at rest, adds a grace to every scene. Above all, it is beautiful when it beats its way up into the air to a height, and then, expanding its wings, comes floating down again. This exquisite performance may be seen at almost any time, for the ring-dove sometimes has three broods in the year, and if, as is supposed, it is a part of the bird's courtship, is as appropriate in October as in March. Both birds may sometimes be seen executing this graceful "manoeuvre" together; and it is, I think, the most prettily significant of all bird-gestures. Throughout June may be heard "the deep mellow crush of the wood-pigeon's note, making music that sweetens the calm" of the summer woodlands or the sudden clapping when the startled bird, "on loud-applauding wing," quits its perch. Hardly a country walk can then be taken without seeing, either feeding on the ground, at rest, or on watch upon the trees or flying overhead, the handsome bird, in its plumage of lavender-blue, that seems so wild, and yet can be tamed sooner almost than any bird but the robin.