150 Pancv Pigeons. 



pigeon, which the Antwerp ought not to be. No doubt all the owl 

 tribe are known as short-faced frilled pigeons ; but they would quite 

 as correctly be called blunt-faced, for mere shortness of face is not 

 any desideratum in them, as it takes away room for the filling up of 

 the forehead behind the beak wattle. This, when well developed, gives 

 them, above all else, a look of quality, just as it does the Antwerp. 



The short-faced Antwerp may be (.lifficult to breed good, according 

 to the standard laid down for it ; but, when bred as good as can be, 

 it is no more than a pigeon with some owl points in its head, and, 

 for the most part, clothed iu the mere off colours of fancy pigeons. 

 I think the encouragement it gets tends to foster low art in pigeon 

 breeding, wastes time and trouble that might be much better employed, 

 and that there is no result, from an artistic point of view, in its pro- 

 duction. Many fanciers, whose judgment of pigeons is acknowledged to 

 bo soundj agree with me in this opinion. 



CHAPTER LVII. 



THE TUMBLER PIGEON. 



The above heading causes the almost forgotten past to be remembered. 

 Visions of bygone celebrities, that were known by such names as the 

 red mottle, the blue hen, the red breaster, Hay's white cock, and such 

 like, crowd up from the days of the springtime of life. I recall the 

 feat of my little blue tumbler which, when heading against a strong 

 wind, and neither making nor losing any headway, turned clean over 

 forty times within the minute, in the same aerial space. The jpennies 

 that ought to have been spent on biscuits to appease the mid-day appetite, 

 were hoarded up till such a sum was accumulated as would cause some 

 weU-known performer to change ownership ; and then there was \oy in 

 fetching it home, and the basket was opened many times on the way for 

 " another look." I fancy there are more tumbler pigeons kept in this 



