The wood-pigeons are the most prominent birds in the copse this year. In previous seasons there were hardly any--one or two, perhaps; sometimes the note was not heard for weeks. There might have been a nest; I do not think so; the pigeons that come seemed merely to rest _en route_ elsewhere--occasional visitors only. But last autumn (1880) a small flock of seven or eight took up their residence here, and returned to roost every evening. They remained the winter through, and even in the January frosts, if the sun shone a little, called now and then. Their hollow cooing came from the copse at midday on January 1, and it was heard again on the 2nd. During the deep snows they were silent, but I constantly saw them flying to and fro, and immediately it became milder they recommenced to call. So that the wood-pigeon's notes have been heard in the garden--and the house--with only short intervals ever since last October, and it is now May. In the early spring, while walking up the Long Ditton road towards sunset, the place from whence you can get the most extended view of the copse, they were always flying about the tops of the trees preparatory to roosting. The bare slender tips of the birches on which they perched exposed them against the sky. Once six alighted on a long birch-branch, bending it down with their weight, not unlike a heavy load of fruit. As the stormy sunset flamed up, tinting the fields with momentary red, their hollow voices sounded among the trees. Now, in May, they are busy; they have paired, and each couple has a part of the copse to themselves. Just level with the gardens the wood is almost bare of undergrowth; there is little to obstruct the sight but the dead hanging branches, and one couple are always up and down here. They are near enough for us to see the dark marking at the end of the tail as it is spread open to assist the upward flight from the ground to the tree. Outside the garden gate, about twenty yards distant, there stand three or four young spruce-firs; they are in the field, but so close as to touch the copse hedge. To the largest of these one of the pigeons comes now and then; he is half inclined to choose it for his nest, and yet hesitates. The noise of their wings, as they rise and thresh their strong feathers together over the tops of the trees, may often be heard in the garden; or you may see one come from a distance, swift as the wind, suddenly half close two wings, and, shooting forward, alight among the branches. They seem with us like the sparrows, as much as if the house stood in the midst of the woods at home. The coo itself is not tuneful in any sense; it is hoarse and hollow, yet it has a pleasant sound to me--a sound of the woods and the forest. I can almost feel the gun in my hand again. They are pre-eminently the birds of the woods. Other birds frequent them at times, and then quit the trees: but the ring-dove is the wood-bird, always there some part of the day.