thirty late returns were noted at Charleroi and at Mons on the same day. These goings and comings are all naturally explained by the law of retracement. Our winged travelers, although they formed a single band at their departure from Orleans, doubtless soon broke up into several groups; we have already observed that it was necessary for them to battle against rough weather. Now the carrier pigeons are not all in this respect equally provided. The little pigeon of Liège flies with extraordinary swiftness in ordinary weather. The full-plumed pigeons of Antwerp, endowed with considerable muscular strength, while they cannot vie with the Liège pigeons in ordinary weather, can, however, battle with a strong wind. It is then quite natural that our pigeons of different powers starting out together should divide up along the route according to their comparative strength. A pigeon from Mons, finding himself in the midst of a band of birds seeking Charleroi, follows them to their destination; then, having seen them scatter to their different homes he remains alone, lost on the roofs of a strange city. Mons is not far distant from Charleroi and the lost one need only rise into the air to see his own home. But he does not do so, for he has in previous journeys become accustomed to using only the sense of direction to find his way home from a distance; it never occurs to him to use his sense of sight. Retracing the road taken to reach Charleroi, he flies to the point in Orleans where he was set at liberty in the morning. Tired by the long journey he has made he rests for one night. The next morning he gets his bearings, finally finds the reverse of the journey taken two days before by the railroad and returns to Mons. The thirty-two pigeons who returned to Orleans on the evening of their release and the next day disappeared had very probably gone through an experience similar to this.
The example we have just cited is certainly very interesting. We have established our position with facts, and, when facts were lacking, with simple conjectures in order to explain the goings and comings of the pigeons. We have therefore in our conclusion, if not certitude, at least great probability. But we will now give a few cases more conclusive than the first.
A pigeon belonging to a fancier in Grand-Couronne fell into the garden of General M, at Évreux. On the same day we had to go to Rouen. We took the lost pigeon with us and set him free in the station at Grand-Couronne, near his own cote. The pigeon took his bearings and flew off to Évreux, to the house of General M. Again captured he was this time sent back to his owner by post. When released at his cote he no longer tried to return to Évreux. The pigeon, stopping to rest a minute and eat near the house of General M, did not for an instant think of this unknown house as a new home. It meant for him. only a point in the journey previously made and to be therefore the point of departure for his further flight. After some hours of rest he
