were about the same age, he had grown faster, was bigger, and
incidentally handsomer, though the fanciers cared little for
that. He seemed fully aware of his importance, and early showed a
disposition to bully his smaller cousins. His owner prophesied
great things of him, but Billy, the stable-man, had grave doubts
over the length of his neck, the bigness of his crop, his
carriage, and his over-size. "A bird can't make time pushing a
bag of wind ahead of him. Them long legs is dead weight, an' a
neck like that ain't got no gimp in it," Billy would grunt
disparagingly as he cleaned out the loft of a morning.


II

The training of the birds went on after this at regular times.
The distance from home, of the start, was "jumped" twenty-five or
thirty miles farther each day, and its direction changed till the
Homers knew the country for one hundred and fifty miles around
New York. The original fifty birds dwindled to twenty, for the
rigid process weeds out not only the weak and ill-equipped, but
those also who may have temporary ailments or accidents, or who
may make the mistake of over-eating at the start. There were many
fine birds in that flight, broad-breasted, bright-eyed,
long-winged creatures, formed for swiftest flight, for high
unconscious emprise, for these were destined to be messengers in
the service of man in times of serious need. Their colors were
mostly white, blue, or brown. They wore no uniform, but each and
all of the chosen remnant had the brilliant eye and the bulging
ears of the finest Homer blood; and, best and choicest of all,
nearly always first among them was little Arnaux. He had not much