THE PIGEON BOOK, 137 



be too fine in beak and yet altogether out of proportion to 

 the head. " A lucifer match stuck in a potato " I once 

 heard a very -fine beaked bird called, and a very apt de- 

 scription of its head it was. Like the " Scandaroony " 

 type, both are very ugly, useless to breed from, and the 

 sooner the piecrust closes over them the better. The beak 

 should be straight and fairly even in substance through- 

 out; not wedge-shaped, i.e., very broad at the base and 

 fine at the point, like a sparrow's. It should not have 

 a hard, dry, horny appearance, but should be delicate 

 in texture and of a clear flesh or delicate salmon tone. 

 The beak should be clean in all colours, even in blacks 

 and blues, although in these two colours the Standard 

 permits of a slight stain on upper mandible — a wise 

 proviso, which proves with what care and judgment the 

 Standard was compiled. The clean salmon beak is, of 

 course, the prettier, but I have found that birds very 

 sound and rich in colour are mostly stained on beak, and 

 I have also found that clean-beaked blacks, if persistently 

 bred together, lose in a generation or two the jet-black 

 colour, and become brown in tone, bronzy on neck, and 

 throw among their youngsters birds of a pinky, dunnish 

 tone, which are, of course, useless. The eye of a Magpie 

 should be white, with a black pupil; the cere should be 

 fine and of a bright coral colour ; the feathering round 

 the eyes should be close up to the cere, leaving no gaps 

 or bare spaces. 



I now come to type of body, which includes size, shape, 

 and carriage — most important points which do not receive 

 from all fanciers the attention they deserve. Often I hear 

 a bird described as " perfect," only to find on inspection 

 that it is " duck-bodied " — that is to say, devoid of all 

 those fine, racy body qualities which are so characteristic 

 of a typical Magpie. The neck should be long, finest 



