Couriers of the Air. 63 



fifteen miles away. She flew back in thirteen 

 minutes. In striking contrast with the rate at 

 which birds with long pointed wings fly is the 

 fact that one of a pair of starlings (which are 

 short-winged birds) was captured and sent in a 

 basket a distance of upwards of thirty miles by 

 train. It was then freed, and was three hours 

 before it found its way back to its nestlings. 



To turn from swallows to pigeons. The 

 power of pigeons on the wing is proverbial. All 

 trained birds of this species have two qualifi- 

 cations in a marked degree. The first is speed ; 

 the second long and sustained powers of flight. 

 This proposition can be amply demonstrated, 

 and the following are some of the most remark- 

 able records. On the 6th of October, 1850, Sir 

 John Ross despatched a pair of young pigeons 

 from Assistance Bay, a little west of Wellington 

 Sound ; and on October I3th a pigeon made its 

 appearance at the dovecote in Ayrshire, Scot- 

 land, whence Sir John had the pair he took out. 

 The distance direct between the two places is 

 two thousand miles. An instance is on record 

 of a pigeon flying twenty-three miles in eleven 

 minutes ; and another flew from Rouen to Ghent, 

 one hundred and fifty miles, in an hour and a 

 half. An interesting incident of flight is the 

 case of a pigeon which, in 1845, fell wounded 

 and exhaused at Vauxhall Station, then the 

 terminus of the South-Western Railway. It 



