NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 
455 
villa near Florence — Decameron, from tlie Greek, meaning ten 
days. I subjoin the authority of B. Lambert in the Hisiory and 
Survey of London, &c. — . . " Were soon damped by a terrible 
pestilence, which is said to have spread from India over all the 
country westward of it, and reached England in 1348, where it 
destroyed immense numbers of the inhabitants, so that it Avas 
computed that in the city of London no more than one in ten 
survived the mortality. ... I hear from the Eev. Mr. Maskell, 
of Emmanuel Hospital, that many thousands were buried in the 
environs of Charter House, &c. Boccaccio asserts, in his preface 
to his Decameron, that in Florence alone the distemper carried 
away some one hundred thousand souls I " 
I find that it is not generally known to my friends that the 
triangular space of ground just in front of Tattersall's gate, near 
the toj) of Sloane Street, is railed round because it is consecrated 
ground. At the time of the plague of London, this locality was 
quite in the suburbs, and there was a plague pit here, wherein 
a vast number of people who died of this disease were in- 
terred. 
Peeforming Pigeons, p. 253. — In January 1874, a Frenchman 
was going about the neighbourhood of Eegent's Park with perform- 
ing pigeons. It was very interesting to notice how well he had 
trained these pretty birds. When at work one morning I heard 
a trumpet sounded, and upon looking out of the window, I saw 
the man with his pigeons. The birds were sitting on the top of 
a sort of ornamental cage, and at a given signal they all flew off 
with great rapidity up the street. They flew right away, keeping 
about the height of the top of an omnibus, for about 100 to 150 
yards ; they then wheeled about suddenly, and returned to their 
master, and, one by one, alighted on the handle of a red flag 
which he was continually waving in the air. Nearly all the 
while the birds were flying the man blew his trumpet, and at 
times sounded a shrill whistle. Occasionally the birds went 
away over the tops of houses, and returned with a beautiful 
rush round the corner by a street different from that where they 
started. A gentleman living opposite me keeps a number of 
pigeons at the top of his house ; and it was most interesting to 
observe the actions of these tame pigeons, who evidently were 
exceedingly astonished to see the performing pigeons go through 
their flight. Some of these trained pigeons hovered in the air 
almost as tliough fixed there with wire ; I have never seen the 
hovering so well marked. I forgot to mention that during the 
flight of these birds one in particular perches on the top of a 
house, and remains there til] called by some peculiar signal. 
