THE HUN PIGBOS. 



that if once crossed, the breed cannot be bred back again ; 

 hence, these cross-bred birds are always deficient in some 

 point — either the voice or one of the turns is wanting. 

 As a case in point, my father, many years back, was very 

 desirous of obtaining some trumpeter pigeons, and could then 

 only procure one cock and his half-bred daughter, from which 

 he bred, matching the cook again with his daughters of the 

 second and third generations, without obtaining one young 

 bird with the tu** over the beak. At the fourth generation 

 he reared a hanasome, black-mottled youcg cock with the 

 desired tuft; but, to his great disappointment, he did not 

 trumpet, although he was fifteen-sbrteenths pure bred, and 

 breeding so close stopped reproduction. Surely such experi- 

 ments go far to prove the distinctness of what are sometimes 

 called mere varieties." 



TEE NTDT. 



This is an extremely pretty little bird. In shape it is some- 

 thing like the tumbler, and, like the latter bird, it has a tuft of 

 feathers rising from the back of the head. " To be perfect," 

 says a writer who has made this bird his peculiar study, " the 

 bead, flight-feathers, and tail, should be of some dark colour, 

 either yellow, red, or black. The breast, belly, upper part of 

 the wiugs, back, and neck, should be pure white, and there 

 should be a frill of white feathers over the head. According to 

 the colour of the head, it is called the red, black, or yellow- 

 headed nun. If the bird have foul feathers, that is, if he have 

 white or speckled feathers, where they should be one of these 

 colours, whether it be on the wings, head, or tail, it is called 

 foul-feathered, and the value of the bird is much less than it 

 woxild have been if the feathers were pure in colour. He 

 should have a small bead and beak, and the larger the tuft or 

 hood is the handsomer does the bird appear, and the more 

 valuable it is reckoned by the fancy." 



On the continent there are two sub-varieties of tbe nun, the 

 one called the beard pigeon, both in Prance and Germany ; but 

 it differs only in having white flights, the head and tail being 

 the only coloured part ; the other having the tail also white, 

 the head only coloured. By the French amateurs, tbis is called 

 the death's-head pigeon. 



" The most beautiful specimens of nuns," saya Temminck, 

 ■' are those which are black, but have the quill-feathers and the 

 head white : they are called Nowncdns MoMrins." The most 



