EXHIBITION ANTWEEPS. 



181 



birds of the same variety and with analogous properties are 

 now exhibited as "long-faced," "medium-faced," and "short- 

 faced," it is better to adopt the generic name employed above, 

 though the short-faced is the perfect type of the breed. There 

 is no doubt that this is really a Belgian bird, and has arisen 

 from the predominance in some localities of that Owl blood, 

 which, as stated in . Chapter XIX., is one of the component 

 parts of the Homing Pigeon. To this day a frilled breast 

 is no unheard-of occurrence, though rare; and the Owly type 

 has to be rather care- 

 fully guarded against 

 in breeding. 



Most of the pro- 

 perties of the Exhibi- 

 tion Antwerp are in 

 the head, of which 

 we append an illus- 

 tration of the full 

 natural size. It will 

 be seen at a glance 

 that great capacity 

 and intelligence are 

 the characteristics of 

 this head ; and when 

 trained these birds 

 often make fair 

 Homers, though now 

 too valuable to be used for such a purpose, and seldom flown. 



First of all, we observe that the word " short-faced " is a 

 misnomer, because slwrtness is iiot a property. If it were, then 

 the shorter it was the better the bird would be, which is 

 not the case. Fig. 25 represents the profile, and Fig. 26 a 

 top view of a good mature head ; and if it were any shorter it 

 would be so much worse. The first and great point is that the 



Head of Aktweef. 



