ANIMAL FRIENDS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 19838, 7 January 1928, Page 4 (Supplement)

ANIMAL FRIENDS.

A PIGEONS ADVENTURE* " I am so sorry you halv© been ill,** said the Visitor. "I am rather glad," replied the Invalid, "for my illness saved a life. " This room," she explained, " is really the spare bedroom, and has not been used for a long time, bat yesterday the doctor said my own room was not airy enough, and after touring the house, lie chose this one because of the French windows and the balcony. " I had not been here long before I heard a most extraordinary noise, like a violent struggle. I cams to the conclusion that it was a bird in chimney, and, as there was an anthracite stove in the fireplace, it could not get out. I rang for someone, and begged them to get a man to remove the stove, but the noise was not heard again, and they laughed at me. They burned a whole newspaper in the stove, saying tfcai if there was a bird in the chimney it would certainly bo heard now, and there was no sound. Still I persisted, and, as invalids have to be humoured, a workman was fetched, and the stove was removed. Not a flutter was heard, but when the man was gone, and I had nearly forgotten the matter, I heard a little noise, and saw a pigeon standing in the fireplace. " He was blinking, and seemed dazed at the brightness of the room after the dark chimney. I rang again and displayed him in triumph. They brought a pan of water and a bag of bird seed, and the pigeon boldly took a drink. He spent the next two and a-half hours in feeding and drinking with hardly a pause. Then he took a trial flight on to the verandah rail, and the next minute he was gene. " He had a band on his log, and was evidently a racing pigeon which had got lost and had had nothing to eat for a long time. Probably he had been blown down the chimney one stormy night and was too- weak to struggle up. " But for my coming here he must have Eerished, for nobody would have heard im. "I have only one regret," the Invalid concluded, " and that is that I can't hear him explaining to the other birds the reason he was so late home. I can almost hear hi)* mother saying, * Blown down a chimney, indeed! I wonder you don't say you were delayed because you were blown across the "Atlantic!' "