Democratic Sentinel, Volume 17, Number 13, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 April 1893 — A Pigeon with a Memory. [ARTICLE]

A Pigeon with a Memory.

It seems really impossible to extinguish the homing instinct in a good pigeon. A wonderful story is told by a pigeon fancying journal of a French carrier pigeon which was captured by the 1 German soldiers during the siege of Paris in 1870. The bird was being carried in a balloon from Paris to some point In the country whence it was expected to return to Paris with a message. It was taken tj the German headquarters and presented to the commander, Prince Frederick Charles, who sent it to his mother in Germany. Here it was placed in a splendid roomy avairy and carefully fed and nourished; but although it was kept here, living in Ihe lap of royal luxury for four years, the French pigeon did not forget its fatherland. - At the end of that time the aviary was left open one day. The pigeon flew out, mounted high In the air, flew about for a moment, as if to find the points of the compass, and started in a straight line for Paris. Two days afterward it beat its wings against the entrance to its old loft in the Boulevard de Clichy. There it was recognized, and its case being brought to public attention it was honored as a patriot returned from foreign captivity. It remained at the Paris Jardin d’Acclimatation until it died in 1878.