370 THE FEATHERED TRIBES. 



time, in the wild and unfrequented spots of some of the islands they visited ; and no 

 wonder, when the_y considered it to proceed from the savage cries of hostile natives in 

 their ambush about to break forth upon them. Fear, when once excited, as is well 

 loiown, strangely exaggerates what is seen, as well as what is heard. 



THE CARRIER PIGEON. 



Such is the name given to one sfiecies of this numerous family, from the circumstance 

 of the birds belonging to it carrying letters and small packets from one place to another. 

 The carrier pigeon is easily distinguished from the other varieties by a broad circle of 

 naked white skin round the ej^es, and by its dark blue or blackish colour. 



Sandys traces the use of these birds to a remote antiquity. He states that Thomos- 

 tones gave notice to his father in ^Egina, of his victory at the Olympian games the same 

 day, by means of a pigeon stained with purple. 



When, during the Crusades, Acre was besieged by the Christian forces, Saladin kept 

 open a correspondence for some time with the besieged by means of these winged messen- 

 gers ; but one having been accidentally brought to the groiuid, by means of an arrow, 

 before it reached the city, the stratagem was discovered, and the commimication which 

 woidd have animated the courage of those to whom it was addressed, by the announce- 

 ment of speedy succour, being thus betrayed to the Christians, such measures were taken 

 as compelled the surrender of Acre before Saladin could arrive to relieve it. 



In former times the pigeon was em^jloyed in the English factory, to convey intelli- 

 gence from Scanderoon to Aleppo, of the arrival of the company's ships in that port. 

 The name of the ship, the hour of her arrival, and whatever else coidd be comprised in 

 a small compass, was written on a slip of paper, and secured under the pigeon's wing, so 

 as not to impede her flight ; while her feet were bathed in vinegar to keep them cool, 

 and prevent her being tempted by the sight of water, to alight, whereby delay might 

 have been occasioned, and the biUet lost. 



The pigeons have been known to perform the journey in two hours and a half, the 

 distance being betwixt sixty and seventy miles in a straight line. The messenger-bird 

 had a young brood at Aleppo, and was sent, in an uncovered cage to Scanderoon, from 

 whence, as soon as set at liberty, she returned with all speed to her nest. It was then 

 usual, when the season had come for the arrival of the ships, to send pigeons to be readj^ 

 at the port, but if the bird remained more than a fortnight, she would forget her young, 

 and could not safely be trusted. The pigeons, when let fly from Scanderoon, instead of 

 bending their course towards the high moimtains surrounding the plain, mounted at 

 once directly up, soaring almost perpendicularly till out of sight, as if to surmount at 

 once aU obstacles, intercepting their view of the place of their destination. 



The rapidity of the flight of these birds is truly astonishing. Lithgow states that one 

 of them would carry a letter from Babylon to Aleppo — which was usually to a man a 

 thirty-days' journey — in the space of forty-eight hours. A wager was laid, some years 

 ago, to determine the speed of these birds with some approach to exactness. A gentleman 

 sent a carrier-pigeon from London, by the coach, to a friend in Eury St. l-^linunds, in 

 Suffolk, and with it a note, desiring that the pigeon, two days after its arrival there, 

 might be thrown up precisely when the town clock struck nine in the morning. 

 Accordingly, this was done ; and ihe jjigeon arrived in London, and flew into the Bull 

 Inn, in Jiisliopsgatc-strcct, at half an hour past eleven o'clock, on the same morning 

 ha^^ng accomplished a flight of seventy-two miles in two hours and a half. 



The attachment of the bird to its native place, and i)articularly to the .spot whei'o it 

 has brought up, or is bringing up ils young, was thus rendered useful to mankind. The 

 bird was convoyed from its homo to the place whence the information was intended to be 



