Captain Dove was up in the old wooden pulpit, gazing solemnly down upon his company, who, having stacked their arms in the porch, now sat in the bare pews singing a Sunday-school hymn with great vigour and relish.
"Let us pray," said Captain Dove, with as much reverence as an army chaplain; and, folding his hands, he repeated a prayer which he thought all would know an excellent little prayer, but not exactly appropriate to the morning, for it was
Captain Dove looked rather taken aback at this outbreak in the ranks; but, being a dignified and calm personage, he quelled the rising rebellion with great tact and skill, by saying, briefly
A second time the dove is sent forth, and this is how the poet tells of it:--
"Then the chief of seamen knew that gladness was at hand, and he sent forth after three weeks the wild dove who came not back again; for she saw the land of the greening trees.
Again she dove and with strong strokes headed for the shore.
Like a flash she dove once more and, turning, struck out rapidly straight back beneath the oncoming boat.
Instead he was thinking of a girl with eyes as soft as a dove
's, lips like a thread of scarlet and small white teeth as even as a flock of his own Shropshire sheep.
Two chicks hatched at Bristol Zoo Gardens seven weeks ago, the first successful breeding of Socorro doves
there for four years, and have already left the nest.
They were bred after a female dove
arrived from Burgers' Zoo, in the Netherlands, as a mate for Bristol Zoo's lone male bird.
When the doves
are caught in a hunter's net, the dove
queen entreats them to make a herculean effort to raise the net in flight.