172 LIVE TEMPERATURE. [CHAP. v. 



the little piquant dishes for which the smaller birds are 

 in such demand ; so that the poulterer, to furnish the re- 

 quisite supply, will have to be much more wanton in his 

 destructiveness, if not in his cruelty, than the Pigeon 

 shooters. 



" This exhibition was founded by an Englishman of 

 the name of Bryon, who is the publisher of the French 

 ' Racing Calendar,' and I received from him the fol- 

 lowing curious facts : * At its commencement, sixteen 

 poor peasants were employed to bring the birds from 

 Normandy and Picardy, travelling on foot with their 

 dossers (hottes)<m their backs. They are now enabled, 

 by the liberal reward of their labours, to convey them, 

 to the amount of 2000 per week, in well-appointed car- 

 riages, drawn by horses of their own.' [It is likely, we 

 have seen, that many of the Pigeons that travel thus to 

 Paris in state, in carriages, with their own horses, re- 

 turn exulting on their wings, to their native Dove- 

 cotes.] 



" To this extent may some good be said to arise out 

 of evil. And one more benefit has sprung out of this 

 mania for Pigeon-shooting ; it has created a great im- 

 provement in gun-making, and has been the cause of 

 one of the first artists in that line in London transfer- 

 ring his business to Paris, where I have reason to be- 

 lieve he has met with much encouragement ; and no 

 doubt Paris gun-makers have taken a leaf out of his 

 book."* 



The high temperature of the living Pigeon ought to 

 be noticed, before we quite quit these birds : when 

 handled, especially in a partially-fledged state, they 



* Vol. i. pp. 203, 4. 



