STORIES OF SUCCESS WITH PLYMOUTH ROCK HOMERS 
able to, think for himself. However, I do not 
inbreed pigeons, and I do not think you have 
authority for making the sweeping statement 
that in a wild state the pigeons almost in- 
variably mate in pairs as they were hatched. 
I will prove that to you right now by asking 
you, Have you not seen male pigeons, both in 
a wild state and domesticated, fighting for the 
ossession of a female? Certainly, we all 
ave; it is an every-day occurrence among 
pigeons, depending on a,hundred different 
notions which may form in the minds of the 
pigeons. This domination of the strongest 
and handsomest over the weakest and ugliest 
is the law of life among human beings as well 
asanimals. This survival of the fittest would 
not be true if it was the law and the rule and 
the custom, call it what you will, for nest- 
mates to mate for the reason of propiaay 
alone. Now, as a matter of fact I know that 
there are a great many Homer fanciers in this 
country, mostly Englishmen, who have bred 
pigeons all their lives, who win prizes with 
Homers as well as other kinds of pigeons, 
which are the product of inbreeding. There 
are a dozen fanciers within fifty miles of my 
plant in Massachusetts who come to my place 
regularly and there pick out young birds which 
we band with seamless bands for them and 
sell them when weaned, and I know for a fact 
because some have told me so, that they take 
these birds and inbreed them. However, 
as a matter of business, it wotld not do for me 
or for anybody selling pigeons in the open 
market to inbreed them, because there is a 
sort of horror, a repugnance, among people 
generally, especially women. against that sort 
of thing. Nearly half my trade is among 
women, and I think that as a rule they master 
pigeons better than men, and I don’t think I 
would sell to many women if I advocated 
and practised inbreeding. If you are a 
follower of poultry, you will read advice from 
many theorists and impractical men, who 
work eight hours a day at something else, but 
who will sit at a desk in their evening hours 
and with a pen direct bree ing operations for 
anybody offhand, and one of the stock re- 
marks of these folks, unable to follow their own 
ideas in breeding successfully is, when some 
one writes them that his or her pigeons are not 
raising young satisfactorily: ‘Your pigeons 
are probably inbred, and are worthless, being 
weak.’’ It is a foolish and senseless remark, 
because it is a guess, and nothing more. In 
my Manual I decry inbreeding and, as I say, 
do not practise it, because I do not think it is 
nature’s way. An animal wants a handsome 
and attractive, or otherwise satisfactory mate, 
and is willing to fight for it—this is nature’s 
way. While I am on this subject, I will tell 
why people fail, as some do, with pigeons. 
There are generally men and women who have 
failed with poultry, and with everything. It 
is their fault not the fault of the pigeons. If 
they start with pigeons, strong and rugged 
birds, it is wp to them to get results. I have 
seen people start with pige who absolutely 
could not get an egg or a®Squab to amount 
to anything for mont.s, and then sell out to 
somebody of sense and gumption who inside 
of a month would be doing so well with the 
birds that he would buy more. Is this sur- 
prising? Not if you have had much expe- 
rience with people and their habits. There is 
a large percentaze of folks who cannot man- 
age their own eating and drinking right; their 
bowels are always out of order; they are dos- 
ing with patent medicines; they seldom or 
never bathe. Others who look after them- 
selves perhaps better cannot do the simplest 
things of life successfully; cannot write their 
names legibly; cannot compose a letter and 
address the envelope correctly; cannot man- 
age their children so as to hold their respect; 
cannot keep friends with their neighbors; can- 
not earn money, or cannot save it; and so on. 
Yet many of these people (and there are 
hundreds of them who turn to a new thing like 
squabs for the long-sought touchstone) will 
take hold of animal breeding, requiring at the 
outset, and all the time, the sterlinz qualities 
of patience and common sense, not to speak 
of some degree of skill which must be acquired, 
and then wonder why they fail. From squabs 
they go to bees, or vice versa, or to ginseng 
or pecan nuts, or truck gardening, or poultry, 
but never back again to something at which 
they have failed. The Creator put these 
things into the world, and the devil has put 
many temptations alonz too, to winnow out 
people. to separate by their own acts the wise 
rom the foolish, the skilful from the unskilful, 
the good from the bad, etc. The acquisition 
of a flock of pigeons, or anything else, will not 
turn a poor tool into a good one. 
SPEAKS OF US IN HIGHEST TERMS. 
Enclosed find draft on New York in $10.25, 
for which please ship me four hundred pounds 
mixed eon grain. My Homers are doing 
nicely, I have only lost one more bird, two in 
all, Quite a number are laying, a few setting. 
It affords me pleasure to speak in the highest 
terms of the Plymouth Rock Squab Company. 
—W.B. W., Arkansas, : 
ONE BIRD SICK, THE ONLY ONE IN A 
YEAR AND A HALF OF BREEDING. You 
no doubt remember me as one who purchased 
two lots of Homers from you a year ago last 
January. I am now prepared to sell squabs 
as my enclosed card will show you. I send 
you this card to show you that I have not been 
asleep in the business, and that I have given 
constant care to the flock ever since the first 
day I asked you, What is a squab? Ha, ha. 
It makes me laugh to think that I was so 
green. I now have one good customer here 
who gives me $3 a dozen for them, but he says 
they are not selling very fast this time of 
year (May). Others said, when I presented 
LETTERS FROM CUSTOMERS RECEIVED BY PLYMOUTH ROCK SQUAB COMPANY 
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