EXPERIENCE OF PROMINENT WASHINGTON PUBLIC MAN 

 BREEDING PLYMOUTH ROCK HOMERS 



I wish you would send me an outfit of your Extra 

 Plymouth Rock Homers, mated and handed. I want 

 to see how they will turn out. I have already 

 quite a large lot of pigeons hut they are doing 

 so poorly that I do not expect to keep them. I 

 expect better results from the ones which I order. 



The letters from customers printed in this book are evidence of the wide- 

 spread interest on the American continent in squab breeding not only for 

 revenue and for one's table, but also as a pastime and instructive hobby. 

 It will not be forgotten that the master mind of Charles Darwin evolved 

 "The Origin of Species" from pigeon breeding. The ideas he conceived and 

 the laws he discovered might have been worked out with other animals, but 

 not within the span of his lifetime, with the thoroughness he accomplished, 

 because pigeons breed rapidly, and in other respects are ideal for experiment. 



Prominent in political life at Washington are customers who give part of 

 their spare time enthusiastically to this work. One of these ordered of us 

 in January, 1908, as indicated by the letter printed at the top of this page. 

 The next letter was as follows: 



I am greatly pleased with the birds sent me, and 

 they seem to be all that -you have said in regard 



to them. 



We wrote him in December, lliflS, to interest him in our Cameaux, and 



received the following letter: 



I have your letter of some days ago in regard to 

 the Homers you sont me. They were very fine, and 

 I was well pleased with them. One disaster after 

 another has followed these birds until now I have 

 none left. Jirst, an owl got in among them and 

 pulled heads off, which was followed by some other 

 misfortune. I shall never experiment here again 

 with them, but when I retire from the field of my 

 labors and go back home, I certainly intend to 

 keep pigeons. I thank you very much for calling 

 my attention to your new Plymouth Rock Carneaux. 



We are not at liberty to print the writer's name. We call attention to 

 this to point the moral that serious-minded men of large affairs turn to 

 squab raising with lively and sustained interest. (Incidentally, another 

 moral is, Beware of owls !) 



300 



