192 THE PRACTICAL PIGEON KEEPEE. 



side, however, remains very good in flights. Few birds have 

 more than nine and ten. The beak should be dark in black 

 Nuns, light in the other colours. A dark beak in blacks and a 

 low-cut bib are most likely to be accompanied by the standard 

 number of flights. The eye-cere is also very nearly black, and 

 many black Nuns have almost black legs. 



The Nun is trimmed for exhibition more than almost any 

 bird. About the line of the bib is often weeded a little to make 

 the line sharp ; but most of all is the head plucked near the 

 root of the crest, to prevent coloured feathers growing up 

 against the white shell. So notorious and universal is this 

 that it keeps many from the breed, even an honest bird being 

 suspected. Nuns are hardy and good feeders, and some people 

 who like them keep them as nurses for short-faced Tumblers. 



Quite lately, Messrs. Baily and Son have re-introduced from 

 Germany a bird that is almost a Nun reversed, the chief 

 difference being that the head is not so Tumbler-shaped, but 

 more that of a common Toy. The head and bib and tail are 

 white, the shell and all the rest black. The chief difference is 

 that all the wing is black, instead of the flights being white, as 

 they would be by strict analogy. The birds are also generally 

 grouse-legged. This variety was mentioned by Dixon. 



Magpies have ordinary Toy or Dove-house pigeon heads, 

 clean legs, and trim bodies, possessing no properties at all but 

 colour and marking. The marking exactly resembles that of 

 the Plying Tumbler shown in the engraving at p. 132 as a 

 " Saddle." It covers the head, neck, breast (down to above 

 the thighs), back, rump, tail-coverts, and tail, also the shoulder- 

 coverts ; the rest of the wing, belly, and thighs being white. 

 The eye is a clear pearl, with a red cere or lash round it. The 

 colours are black, red, blue, and yellow. The beak is generally 

 flesh-colour. 



The colours are generally veiy good, especially the black, 



