295 WATTLED PIGEONS. 



fifty English Carriers, an inclination to be broad-skulled and 

 rather down-faced, or Roman-nosed. I consider them, not only 

 from Moore's account, but from their appearance, as the un- 

 doubted originals of our Carriers, which have been brought to 

 their present condition by generations of persevering fanciers. 

 And, after all, how many Carriers out of the hundreds bred 

 annually in England are fit to be penned at a first class-show ? 

 The best birds we have produce plenty not nearly so stout as 

 the best of those T have seen from Bagdad. Were any good 

 Carrier breeder to visit that city, I believe he might find birds 

 which he would consider well worth bringing home with him, 

 but whether of other colours than blue I am unable to say. 



The Dragoon Pigeon. 



Before touching on the Dragoon, it is necessary to say 

 something about the pigeon which our old wi-iters called the 

 Horsem an, a bird holding a position somewhere between the 

 Carrier and Dragoon. Although no longer recognised in the 

 fancy, the Horseman was distinguished from the Carrier in 

 being found in greater variety of colour. It was evidently, 

 when Moore wrote, the pigeon capable of flying the longest 

 distances, and it had then a distinct place in the fancy, as 

 will be seen from the following passage in Moore's work : "This 

 Pigeon in Shape and Make very much resembles the Carrier, 

 only^ it is smaller in all its Properties, viz. Somewhat less in 

 Body, shorter neck'd, the protuberant Flesh upon the Beak 

 Smaller, as likewise that round the Eye, so that there remains 

 a larger Space or Distance between the "Wattle and the Eye, 

 in this Pigeon than in the CaiTier. They are generally more 

 inclin'd to be barrel-headed, and their Eye somewhat pinch'd. 



" It is to this Day a Matter of Dispute, whether this be an 

 original Pigeon : or whether it be not a bastard strain, bred 

 between a Carrier and a Tumbler, or a Carrier and a Powter, 

 and so bred over again from a Carrier, and the oft'ner it is 

 thus bred, the stouter the Horseman becomes. 



