means very pale blue) Barb from two yellow birds. [25] Mr. Blyth informs me that all the domestic races in India have the croup blue; but this is not invariable, for I possess a very pale blue Simmali pigeon with the croup perfectly white, sent to me by Sir W. Elliot from Madras. A slaty-blue and chequered Nakshi pigeon has some white feathers on the croup alone. In some other Indian pigeons there were a few white feathers confined to the croup, and I have noticed the same fact in a carrier from Persia. The Java Fantail (imported into Amoy, and thence sent me) has a perfectly white croup. [26] ‘Les Pigeons,’ etc., p. 37. [27] ‘Treatise on Pigeons,’ 1858, p. 145. [28] J. Moore’s ‘Columbarium,’ 1735; in J. M. Eaton’s edition, 1852, p. 71. [29] I could give numerous examples; two will suffice. A mongrel, whose four grandparents were a white Turbit, white Trumpeter, white Fantail, and blue Pouter, was white all over, except a very few feathers about the head and on the wings, but the whole tail and tail-coverts were dark bluish-grey. Another mongrel whose four grandparents were a red Runt, white Trumpeter, white Fantail, and the same blue Pouter, was pure white all over, except the tail and upper tail-coverts, which were pale fawn, and except the faintest trace of double wing-bars of the same pale fawn tint. [30] It deserves notice, as bearing on the general subject of variation, that not only _C. livia_ presents several wild forms, regarded by some naturalists as species and by others as sub-species or as mere varieties, but that the species of several allied genera are in the same predicament. This is the case, as Mr. Blyth has remarked to me, with Treron, Palumbus, and Turtur. [31] ‘Denkmäler,’ Abth. ii. Bl. 70. [32] ‘The ‘Dovecote,’ by the Rev. E. S. Dixon, 1851, pp. 11-13. Adolphe Pictet (in his ‘Les Origines Indo-Européennes,’ 1859, p. 399) states that there are in the ancient Sanscrit language between 25 and 30 names for the pigeon, and other 15 or 16 Persian names; none of these are common to the European languages. This fact indicates the antiquity of the domestication of the pigeon in the East. [33] English translation, 1601, Book x. ch. xxxvii. [34] ‘Ayeen Akbery,’ translated by F. Gladwin, 4to edit., vol. i. p. 270. [35] J. M. Eaton, ‘Treatise on the Almond Tumbler,’ 1851; Preface, p. 6. [36] As in the following discussion I often speak of the present time, I should state that this chapter was completed in the year 1858. [37] ‘Ornithologie,’ 1600, vol. ii. p. 360. [38] ‘A Treatise on Domestic Pigeons,’ dedicated to Mr. Mayor, 1765. Preface, p. 14. [39] Mr. Blyth has given a translation of part of the ‘Ayeen Akbery’ in ‘Annals and Mag. of Nat. Hist.,’ vol. xix. 1847, p. 104. [40] ‘L’Histoire de la Nature des Oiseaux,’ p. 314. [41] ‘Treatise on Pigeons,’ 1852, p. 64.