Having been invited to join some members of the Society of Antwerp Pigeon Fanciers, he wended his way about five o’clock one morning through the silent streets of the ancient city. A few members of the association, he says, who directed the expedition, were followed by servants carrying two flat baskets, in which the pigeons, about to be dispatched, were carefully deposited. As we proceeded along, my companions related to me some particulars concerning the carrier pigeons, or “_pigeons voyageurs_,” as these winged messengers are designated. The carriers are a peculiar race of pigeons endowed with powers of memory and observation which enable them to find their way to any place by a course along which they have once flown. Every kind of pigeon is not capable of being taught to do this. Of the methods adopted by the Antwerp association for training and teaching these carriers, I learnt the following particulars. Supposing a dispatch of pigeons is to be sent off from Antwerp to Brussels or Paris, the birds are kept for some time at the place of arrival or terminus, and during that interval are plentifully fed and carefully tended. By little excursive flights, taken day by day, they are gradually familiarised with different parts of the town in which they have been nurtured, and with places in its vicinity. When sufficiently practised in finding their way to short distances, the pigeons are conveyed to a station some leagues from their dove-cote. Here they are kept for a time without food, and then set to flight. On taking wing, they rapidly soar to a vast height, scanning the line of the horizon to discern the church spires, or other lofty points which enable them to distinguish their home. Some of the less intelligent birds lose their way, and are seen no more. Those who return home (to Paris, or wherever else it may be), are again plentifully fed. Then after a little space of time they are carried in baskets some miles further in the direction of Antwerp; again they are put on a short allowance of food and negligently tended. When the pigeons depart on their next flight, the Parisian church spires have sunk far beneath the horizon; however, they soon succeed in combining that portion of the route with which they are acquainted with the part as yet unknown to them. They hover round and round in the air, seeking to catch one or other thread that is to guide them through the labyrinth. Some find it; others do not.