+--------------------+-------+-------+-------------------+-------+------+ | |Actual | Too | |Actual | Too | | Name of Breed. |Length.| Short | Name of Breed. |Length.| Short| | |Inches.| by | |Inches.| by | +--------------------+-------+-------+-------------------+-------+------+ | Wild Rock-pigeon | 2.55 | .. | Barb | 2.35 | 0.34 | | Pied Scanderoon | 2.80 | 0.60 | Nun | 2.27 | 0.15 | | Bagadotten Carrier | 2.80 | 0.17 | German Pouter | 2.36 | 0.54 | | Dragon | 2.45 | 0.41 | Jacobin | 2.33 | 0.22 | | Carrier | 2.75 | 0.35 | English Frill-back| 2.40 | 0.43 | | Short-faced Tumbler| 2.05 | 0.28 | Swallow | 2.45 | 0.17 | +--------------------+-------+-------+-------------------+-------+------+ {175} This table shows that in these twelve breeds the sternum is on an average one-third of an inch (exactly .332) shorter than in the rock-pigeon, proportionally with the size of their bodies; so that the sternum has been reduced by between one-seventh and one-eighth of its entire length; and this is a considerable reduction. I have also measured in twenty-one birds, including the above dozen, the prominence of the crest of the sternum relatively to its length, independently of the size of the body. In two of the twenty-one birds the crest was prominent in the same relative degree as in the rock-pigeon; in seven it was more prominent; but in five out of these seven, namely, in a fantail, two scanderoons, and two English carriers, this greater prominence may to a certain extent be explained, as a prominent breast is admired and selected by fanciers; in the remaining twelve birds the prominence was less. Hence it follows that the crest exhibits a slight, though uncertain, tendency to become reduced in prominence in a greater degree than does the length of the sternum relatively to the size of body, in comparison with the rock-pigeon. I have measured the length of the scapula in nine different large and small-sized breeds, and in all the scapula is proportionally shorter (taking the same standard as before) than in the wild rock-pigeon. The reduction in length on an average is very nearly one-fifth of an inch, or about one-ninth of the length of the scapula in the rock-pigeon.