The wood-pigeon is the handsomest, as well as the largest, of the British doves, its dove-grey tints being singularly delicate, soft, and harmonious, and their effect heightened by the white marks and touch of iridescent colour on the neck. On the ground its motions are deliberate, and have a graceful dignity which contrasts strongly with the hurried, eager manner of the rock-pigeon and stock-dove. When startled from its perch it rushes out with great violence and loud clapping of the wings. Its flight is easy and powerful; and before alighting, when it sweeps swiftly and silently on its long, sharp-pointed wings through the glades of a wood, it sometimes has a singularly hawk-like appearance. Even the wild birds in the wood may be deceived by it, and thrown for a few moments into a violent commotion. The wood-pigeon’s familiar song may be heard in favourable weather throughout the year, but its voice gains greatly in beauty in the breeding season. In May and June the love-note of this pigeon is one of the woodland sounds that never fail to delight the ear. It commonly happens that birds improve in voice in the season of courtship; and not only do they acquire greater richness and purity in their strains, but there is at this season an increased beauty and grace in their gestures and motions, and in most species the male indulges in pretty or fantastic antics--a kind of love-dance, in which he exhibits his charms to the female he is desirous of winning. All doves have performances of this kind, and that of the wood-pigeon is not the least graceful. On the ground, or on a branch, he makes his curious display before the female, approaching her with lowered head, and with throat and neck puffed out, in a succession of little hops, spreading his tail fanwise, and flirting his wings so as to display their white bars. All at once he quits his stand, and rising in the air to a height of thirty or forty yards, turns, and glides downwards in a smooth and graceful curve. This mounting aloft and circling descent is very beautiful to see, and produces the idea that the bird has been suddenly carried away by an access of glad emotion. Breeding begins in April, and, in very favourable seasons, even as early as the first week in March. The nest is a slight platform of slender sticks laid across each other on the smaller branches or twigs of a tree, usually at a good height from the ground, and the eggs are two, with pure white, glossy shells. Two, and sometimes three, broods are reared in the season.