A Positivist Pigeon.

Te Aroha News, Volume II, Issue 79, 6 December 1884, Page 4

A Positivist Pigeon.

Tjrr. "Spectator" says:— "The present writer knows a pigeon of exceedingly eccentric disposition, not unlike ' the single gentleman ' in Uickens's ' Curiosity Shop ' in his habits. He keeps scs r cn pigeon- boxes all to himself, and persecutes relentlessly any pigeons which propose to share then' dwellings with him. He is an averse to the society even of the gentler sex, as was St. Antony himself in the Egyptian deserts. Not a pigeon will he admit within the circle of his sway. And yet,in spite of this resolute and inveterate bachelorhood, this eccentric pigeon is always endeavouring to build nests, and looking out for objects of an egg-like form, which he thinks it possible to hatch. He will accumulate twigs and straws now here, now there, at very great pains and labour. He will coo sometimes to inanimate objects, sometimes to captive birds of another breed, sometimes to a kitten or a dog, or oven a (lower-pot, with the quaintest and politest antics. He will sit patiently on china saucers on the mantelpiece of one room, while he accumulates the materials for a nest' to the top of a closet in another room He does not even drive away the possible mother of a family with more zeal than he shows [in seeking to be a good father to ! some imaginary chick which he seems to expect to elicit from a ring-stand or a letterweight. So far as the present writer can judge, he is a pigeon of stoong Matthusian views, who hopes to inaugurate a new regime which may have t>he same relation to the ordinary habits of pigeons which the Positivisfc worship bcai's to the other religions of the world."