FAULTS OV THE OWLT TYPE. 185 



■vre do not want the Antwerp to he an Owl, but to be as 

 distinct as possible, except in points we cannot help. First, 

 such a very short head often has a little gullet, which in an 

 Antwerp is a fault. Secondly, the extreme rotundity at g 

 actually seems to flatten the head at e b, the most prominent 

 point being the point G, near the top of the head ; whereas in 

 the real Antwerp type we want the most prominent part to be 

 the forehead, near b. In the same way, the extreme roundness 

 of skull causes the cheeks to appear hollow, and the head 

 narrow from D to D in the top view. Fig. 31 ; and there is 

 very little space at d between beak-wattle and eye, which is 

 again an Owl and not an Antwerp point. It will also be 

 found that in nearly all cases of such short heads the beak 

 is very much thinner than here represented, and there 

 is rarely so good a beak- wattle; so that these short Owly 

 heads are usually far worse than here shown, which is one of 

 the best of the faulty type. Finally, it is quite enough for a 

 fancier to know that these short Owly heads give no difficulty; 

 they can be bred by the dozen, by simply matching the shortest- 

 faced birds together, there being no counteracting points to 

 interpose obstacles. It was, in fact, by doing so that the false- 

 ness of the type was discovered and a truer one finally found. 



An Exhibition Antwerp, then, should not have gullet, or 

 extreme shortness of face, or small beak-wattle, or small head, 

 or circular profile, for these are Owl points. Neither should 

 it have an exaggerated eye-wattle, with the eye sunk in the 

 centre, or an over-broad cylindrical skuU, which belong to the 

 Barb. It should have a short but massive beak ; full, bold, 

 convex, but oval head, free from hoUows anywhere; and the 

 head must be big, because this size is difficult to produce, and 

 is the one property which most corrects the tendencies above 

 described. While a big head is sought the fancier can never 

 go very far wrong in over-shortness of face. 



To keep up this property of size in the head it is necessary 



