A

mode fowls may be fattened to the highest pitch, and yet preserved in a healthy state, their flesh being equal in quality to that of the barn-door fowl. To suffer fattening fowls to perch, is contrary to the general practice, since it is supposed to bend and deform the breast-bone; but as soon as they become heavy and indolent from feeding, they will rather incline to rest in the straw; and the liberty of perching in the commencement of their cooping, has a tendency to accelerate that period, when they are more inclined to rest on the floor. Fowls, moreover, of considerable growth, will have many of them become already crooked breasted from perching whilst at large, although much depends upon form in this case, since we find aged cocks and hens of the best shape, which have perched all their lives with the breast bone perfectly straight.

6713. The privation of light, by inclining fowls to a constant state of repose, excepting when moved by the appetite for food, promotes and accelerates obesity; but a state of obesity obtained in this way cannot be a state of health, nor can the flesh of animals so fed, equal in flavor, nutriment, and salubrity, that of the same species fed in a more natural way. Economy and market interest may perhaps be best answered by the plan of darkness and close confinement; but a feeder for his own table, of delicate taste, and ambitious of furnishing his board with the choicest and most salubrious viands, will de clare for the natural mode of feeding; and in that view, a feeding-yard, gravelled and turfed, the room being open all day, for the fowls to retire at pleasure, will have a decided preference, as the nearest approach to the barn-door system.

6714. Insects and animal food form a part of the natural diet of poultry, are medicinal to them in a weakly state, and the want of such food may sometimes impede their thriving.

6715. For fattening the younger chickens, the above feeding room and yard is well calculated. These may be put up as soon as the hen shall have quitted her charge, and before they have run off the sucking flesh. For generally when well kept and in health, they will be in fine condition and full of flesh at that period, which flesh is afterwards expended in the exercise of foraging for food, and in the increase of stature, and it may be a work of some time afterwards to recover it, and more especially in young cocks, and all those which stand high upon the leg. In fact, all those which appear to have long legs, should be fattened from the hen, to make the best of them; it being extremely difficult, and often impossible, te fatten long-legged fowls in coops, which, however, are brought to a good weight at the barn-door.

6716. In the choice of full-sized fowls for feeding, the short-legged and early hatched always deserve a preference. The green linnet is an excellent model of form for the domestic fowl, and the true Dorking breed approaches the nearest to such model. In course the smaller breeds and the game are the most delicate and soonest ripe. The London chicken butchers as they are termed, or poulterers, are said to be of all others, the most ⚫dexterous feeders, putting up a coop of fowls and making them thoroughly fat within the space of a fortnight; using so much grease, and that perhaps not of the most delicate kind, in the food. In the common way, this business is often badly managed, fowls being huddled together in a small coop, tearing each other to pieces, instead of enjoying that repose which alone can ensure the wished-for object; irregularly fed and cleaned, until they are so stenched and poisoned in their own excrement, that their flesh actually smells and tastes of it when smoking upon the table. Where a steady and regular profit is required from poultry, the best method, whether for domestic use or sale, is constant high keep from the beginning, whence they will not only be always ready for the table, with very little extra attention, but their flesh will be superior in juiciness and rich flavor, to those which are fattened from a low or emaciated state. Fed in this mode, the spring pullets are particularly fine, and at the same time most nourishing and restorative food. The pullets which have been hatched in March, if high fed from the nest, will lay plentifully through the following autumn, and not being intended for breeding stock, the advantage of their eggs may be taken, and themselves disposed of thoroughly fat for the table in February, about which period their laying will be finished. Instead of giving ordinary and tail corn to fattening and breeding poultry, it will be found most advantageous to allow the heaviest and best, putting the confined fowls upon a level with those fed at the barn door, where they have their share of the weightiest and finest corn. This high feeding shows itself not only in the size and flesh of the fowls, but in the size, weight, and substantial goodness of their eggs, which in those valuable particulars will prove far superior to the eggs of fowls fed upon ordinary corn or washy potatoes; two eggs of the former going further in domestic use than three of the latter. The water also given to fattening fowls should be often renewed, fresh, and clean; indeed, those which have been well kept, will turn with disgust from ordinary food and foul

water.

6717. Barley and wheat are the great dependence for chicken poultry; oats will do for full grown hens and cocks, but are not so good as barley; both, when they have their fill of corn, will eat occasionally cabbage or beet leaves. Steamed potatoes and oatmeal

mixed together make an excellent mess, but must not be given in great quantities, otherwise it renders the flesh soft and flabby.

6718. Cramming. Barley and wheat meal are generally the basis or chief inIgredient in all fattening mixtures for chickens and fowls; but in Sussex, ground oats are used, and there oats are in higher repute for fattening than elsewhere, many large hogs being fattened with them. In the report of that county, the Rev. Arthur Young says, "North Chappel, and Kinsford, are famous for their poultry. They are fattened there to a size and perfection unknown elsewhere. The food given them is ground oats made into gruel, nixed with hog's grease, sugar, pot-liquor, and milk: or ground oats, treacle, and suet, sheep's plucks, &c. The fowls are kept very warm, and crammed morning and night. The pot-liquor is mixed with a few handfuls of oatmeal and boiled, with which the meal is kneaded into crams or rolls of a proper size. The fowls are put into the coop, two or three days before they are crammed, which is continued for a fortnight; and they are then sold to the higglers. These fowls, full grown, weigh seven pounds each, the average weight five pounds; but there are instances of individuals double the weight. They were sold at the time of the survey (1809.), at four to five shillings each. Turner, of North Chappel, a tenant of Lord Egremont, crams two hundred fowls per annum. Great art and attention is requisite to cut the capons, and numbers are destroyed in the operation."

6719. Oakingham in Berks, is particularly famous for fatted fowls, by which many persons in that town and vicinity gain a livelihood. The fowls are sold to the London dealers, and the sum of 1501. has been returned in one market day by this traffic. Twenty dozen of these fowls were purchased for one gala at Windsor, after the rate of half a guinea the couple. At some seasons, fifteen shillings have been paid for a couple. Fowls constitute the principle commerce of the town. Romford, in Essex, is also a great market for poultry, but generally of the store or barn-door kind, and not artificially fed.

6720. The Oakingham method of feeding is to confine the fowls in a dark place, and cram them with paste made of barley-meal, mutton-suet, treacle, or coarse sugar, and milk, and they are found completely ripe in a fortnight. If kept longer, the fever that is induced by this continued state of repletion, renders them red and unsaleable, and frequently kills them. Geese are likewise fed in the same neighborhood, in great numbers, and sold about Midsummer to itinerant dealers, the price at the time the survey was made (1808.), two shillings, to two and three-pence each. It appears utterly contrary to reason, that fowls fed upon such greasy and impure mixtures, can possibly produce flesh or fat so firm, delicate, high flavored, or nourishing, as those fattened upon more simple and substantial food; as for example, meal and milk, without the addition of either treacle or sugar. With respect to grease of any kind, its chief effect must be to render the flesh loose and of indelicate flavor. Nor is any advantage gained, excluding the commercial one.

6721. The methods of cramming by confining in a box the size of the body of the fowl, and allowing its head and vent to project, for intromission and ejection; of blinding the bird for this purpose; or of nailing it to the board; and also the mode of forcing down liquid food by a particular kind of pump, worked by the foot of the feeder, all these and other cruel practices we wish we could abolish in practice, and obliterate from the printed page. 6722. Castration is performed on cocks and hens only in some districts, and chiefly in Berkshire and Sussex. The usual time is when they have left the hen, or when the cocks begin to crow, but the earlier the better. It is a barbarous practice and better omitted. Capons are shunned both by hens and cocks, who it is said will not roost on the same perch with them. The Chinese mode of making capons is fully described and illustrated with cuts in the Farmer's Magazine, vol. vi. p. 46.

6723. Pinioning of fowls is often practised to restrain them from roosting too high, or from flying over fences, &c. ; and is much more convenient than the cutting their wing feathers only. But in the ordinary methods of merely excising the pinion, it is frequently fatal; and almost always so to full grown birds or fowls, by their bleeding to death. To prevent this in the long-winged tribes, as ducks, geese, &c., pass a threaded needle through their wing, close by the inside of the smaller bone, (fig. 719 a), and making a ligature with the thread across the larger bone, and returning it on the outside of all, the principal blood vessels are secured, which could not be accomplished by a ligature confined to the surface only. After the blood vessels have been thus secured, cut off the

719

portion of wing beyond the ligature with scissars or shears. In the gallinacea or short winged tribes, as cocks, hens, &c., the operation is rendered safer, by being performed on the beginning of the next joint (b), making the ligature embrace all the vessels between these two bones by passing it twice through, and securing each bone individually, and passing the ligature around the whole of that part of the wing generally. In this way also birds which have been accidentally winged in shooting may be preserved.

6724. The turkey, (Meleagris gallipavo, L., fig. 720.) is a native of America, and

was introduced into this country from Spain soon after the discovery of the former eountry. The color in the wild state is black, but domestication has produced great variety. In a state of nature they are said to parade in flocks of five hundred, feeding, in general, where abundance of nettles are to be found, the seed of which, and of a small red acorn is their common food in the American woods. They get fat in a wild state, and are soon run down by horses and dogs. They roost on the highest trees, and since the clearing of extensive tracts in America, have become rare in many places: their antipathy to any thing of a red color is well known. In this country they are supposed to be of a tender constitution, which only applies to them when young, for when grown up they will live in the woods with occasional supplies of food, as is actually the case to a great extent in the demesne lands of the Marquis of Bute in Bute.

6725. The varieties are few, and chiefly the copper white, said to be imported from Holland, the former too tender for general culture; and the black Norfolk, esteemed superior to all others.

6726. Breeding. One turkey cock is sufficient for six hens or more, and a hen will cover according to her size from 9 to 15 eggs. The hen is apt to form her nest abroad in a hedge, or under a bush, or in some insecure place; she lays from eighteen to twentyfive eggs, or upwards, and her term of incubation is thirty days. She is a steady sitter, even to starvation, and therefore requires to be regularly supplied with food and water. Buffon says she is a most affectionate mother; but Mowbray observes that from her na tural heedlessness and stupidity, she is the most careless of mothers, and being a great traveller herself, will drag her brood over field, heath, or bog, never casting a regard be hind her to call in her straggling chicks, nor stopping while she has one left to follow her. The turkey differs from the common hen in never scratching for her chicks, leaving them entirely to their own instinct and industry, neither will they fight for their brood, though vigilant in the discovery of birds of prey, when they will call their chickens together by a particular cry, and run with considerable speed. Hence, when not confined within certain limits, they require the attendance of a keeper.

6727. Turkey chicks should be withdrawn from the nest as soon as hatched, and kept very warm by wrapping them in flannel, or putting them under an artificial mother in a warm room or other warm place. Various nostrums are recommended to be given and done at this season, as a peppercorn, and a tea spoonful of milk, immersion in cold wa ter, &c. Mowbray wisely rejected all these unnatural practices, and succeeded by giv. ing curd and hard eggs, or curd and barley meal kneaded with milk, and renewed with clear water rather than milk, as he found the last often scoured them. A sort of vermiceli, or artificial worms, made from pulling boiled meat into strings, he found beneficial for every species of gallinaceous chicken. Two great objects are to avoid superfluous moisture, and to maintain the utmost cleanliness, for which purposes as little slop food is given as possible. A fresh turf of short sweet grass should be daily given is green food, but not snails or worms, as scouring, and no oats; nettle seed, clover, rue, or wormwood gathered, as recommended by the elder housewives. Water is generally preferable to milk. When the weather is favorable, the hen is cooped abroad in the forenoon. During the rest of the day and night, for the first six weeks, she is kept within doors. After this the hen may be cooped a whole day externally for another fortnight, to harden the chickens; and afterwards they may be left to range within certain limits, or tended by an old man or woman, being fed at going out in the morning and returning in the evening. Their ordinary food may be that of the common cocks and hens. They will prefer roosting abroad upon high trees in the summer season, but that cannot generally be permitted with a view to their safe keeping.

6728. Fattening. Sodden barley, or barley and wheat-meal mixed, is the most approved food; and the general mode of management is the same as that of the common cock and hen. They are generally fed so as to come in at Christmas, but they may be fattened early or late. Sometimes, though but rarely, they are caponized. Buffon says, the wild turkey of America has been known to attain the weight of sixteen pounds; the Norfolk turkeys are said sometimes to weigh twenty and thirty pounds; but Mowbray says, he never made any higher than fifteen pounds ready for the spit. The living and dead weight of a turkey are as 21 to 14.

6729. Feathers. Turkeys are sometimes plucked alive, a barbarous practice which ought to be laid aside. Parmentier proposed to multiply the breed of white turkeys in France, and to employ the feathers found on the lateral part of the thighs, instead of the plumes of the ostrich.

6730. The Guinea hen (Numidia meleagris, L., fig. 721.), is a native of Guinea, and found in various parts of South America in a wild state, where it perches on trees, and builds its nest in the palm-tree. It is about the size of a common hen, gregarious, and often found in large flocks; active, restless, and courageous; and will even attack the turkey, though so much above its size. This bird has been said to unite the properties of the pheasant and the turkey; its flesh is more like that of the pheasant

than that of the common cock and hen both in color and taste, and is reckoned a very good substitute for the former bird. It is also very prolific, and its eggs are nourishing and good. It assimilates perfectly with common fowls in its artificial habits and kinds of food; but it has this peculiarity-that the cocks and hens are so nearly alike, that it is difficult to distinguish them, and it has a peculiar gait, and cry, and chuckle.

6731. The peacock (Pavo cristatus, L.) is a native of India, and found in a wild state in Java and Ceylon, where they perch on trees like the turkey in America. The age of the peacock extends to twenty years, and at three the tail of the cock is full and complete. The cock requires from three to four hens; and where the country agrees with them, they are very prolific, a great ornament to the poultry yard and lawn, and useful for the destruction of all kinds of reptiles. Unfortunately, they are not easily

721

kept within moderate bounds, and are very destructive in gardens. They live on the same food as other domestic fowls, and prefer barley. They are in season from February till June; but though a peacock forms a very showy dish, the flesh is ill-colored and coarse, and they are therefore kept more as birds of ornament than of use.

SECT. III. Anserine, or Aquatic Fowls.

6732. The order anseres comprehends the duck, goose, swan, and buzzard. Under a regular system, Mowbray observes, it would be preferable to separate entirely the aquatic from the other poultry, the former to have their houses ranged along the banks of a piece of water, with a fence, and sufficiently capacious walks in front; access to the water by doors to be closed at will. Should the water be of considerable extent, a small boat would be necessary, and might be also conducive to the pleasure of angling.

and Plutarch asserts, that Cato on duck's flesh.

6734. Varieties and species. and the Muscovy.

6733. The duck (Anas boschus, L., fig. 722.) is a native of Britain, and found frequenting the edges and banks of lakes in most parts of Europe. The flesh of this and various other species of the duck is savory and stimulant, and said to afford preferable nourishment to that of the goose, being less gross, and more easily digested. The flesh of the wild duck, though more savory than that of the tame, is reckoned still more easy of digestion. The ancients went even beyond our greatest modern epicures in their high esteem for the flesh of the duck, preserved his whole household in health by dieting them

There are the Rhone, the Aylesbury, the Canvass-backed,

6735. The Rhone duck is originally from France, and generally of a dark-colored plumage, large size, and supposed to improve our breed. They are of darker flesh, and more savory than the English duck; but somewhat coarse. Rhone-ducks have been so constantly imported for a great number of years, that they are very generally mixed with our native breed. The English duck, particularly the white variety, especially when they chance to have light-colored flesh, are never of so high and savory flavor as the darker colors. Muscovy and other foreign species of the duck, are kept rather out of curiosity than for the

table.

6736. The white Aylesbury are a beautiful and ornamental stock, matching well in color with the Embden geese. They are said to be early breeders.

6737. The canvass-backed, bred only on the Potowmac and Susquehanna rivers, are of very recent introduction from America, and are only to be found in a few places near Liverpool; they are said to be the best in the world, and if so will soon become better known.

6738. The Muscovy duck (A. Moschata, L.), is a native of Brazil, but domesticated in Europe. It is a curious dark-colored bird, distinguished by its naked face, kept more out of curiosity than use; to be retained in any place, they must be reared there from the egg, otherwise they will fly away.

6739. Breeding. One drake is generally put to five ducks; the duck will cover from eleven to fifteen eggs, and her term of incubation is thirty days. They begin to lay in February, are very prolific, and are apt, like the turkey, to lay abroad, and conceal their eggs, by covering them with leaves or straws. The duck generally lays by night, or early in the morning; white and light-colored ducks produce similar eggs, and the brown and dark-colored ducks, those of a greenish blue color, and of the largest size. In setting ducks, it is considered safest to put light-colored eggs under light ducks, and the

contrary; as there are instances of the duck turning out with her bill those eggs which were not of her natural color.

6740. During incubation, the duck requires a secret and safe place, rather than any attendance, and will, at nature's call, cover her eggs, and seek her food, and the refreshment of the waters. On hatching, there is not often a necessity for taking away any of the brood, barring accidents; and having hatched, let the duck retain her young upon the nest her own time. On her moving with her brood, prepare a coop upon the short grass, if the weather be fine, or under a shelter, if otherwise: a wide and flat dish of water, often to be renewed, standing at hand; barley, or any meal, the first food. In rainy weather particularly, it is useful to clip the tails of the ducklings, and the surrounding down beneath, since they are else apt to draggle and weaken themselves. The duck should be cooped at a distance from any other. The period of her confinement to the coop, depends on the weather and the strength of the ducklings. A fortnight seems the longest time necessary; and they may be sometimes permitted to enjoy the pond at the end of a week, but not for too great a length at once, least of all in cold wet weather, which will affect, and cause them to scour and appear rough and draggled. In such case they must be kept within a while, and have an allowance of bean or pea-meal mixed with their ordinary food. The meal of buck-wheat and the former is then proper. The straw beneath the duck should be often renewed, that the brood may have a dry and comfortable bed; and the mother herself be well fed with solid corn, without an ample allowance of which, ducks are not to be reared or kept in perfection, although they gather so much abroad.

6741. Duck eggs are often hatched by hens, when ducks are more in request than chickens; also as ducks, in unfavorable situations, are the more easy to rear, as more hardy; and the plan has no objection in a confined place, and with a small stock, without the advantage of a pond; but the hen is much distressed, as is sufficiently visible, and, in fact, injured, by the anxiety she suffers in witnessing the supposed perils of her children venturing upon the water.

6742. Ducks are fattened, either in confinement, with plenty of food and water, or full as well restricted to a pond, with access to as much solid food as they will eat; which last method is preferable. They fatten speedily, in this mode, mixing their hard meat with such a variety abroad as is natural to them, more particularly, if already in good case; and there is no check or impediment to thrift from pining, but every mouthful tells and weighs its due weight. A dish of mixed food is preferable to white corn, and may remain on the bank, or rather in a shed, for the ducks. Barley, in any form, should never be used to fatten ducks or geese, since it renders their flesh loose, woolly, and insipid, and deprives it of that high savory flavor of brown meat, which is its valuable distinction; in a word, rendering it chickeny, not unlike in flavor the flesh of ordinary and yellow-legged fowls. Oats, whole or bruised, are the standard fattening material for ducks and geese, to which may be added pea-meal, as it may be required. wash is profitable to mix up their food, under confinement; but it is obvious, whilst they have the benefit of what the pond affords, they can be in no want of loose food. Acorns in season, are much affected by ducks which have a range; and they will thrive so much 'on that provision, that the quantity of fat will be inconvenient, both in cooking, and upan the table. Ducks so fed, are certainly inferior in delicacy, but the flesh eats high, and is far from disagreeable. Fed on butcher's offal, the flesh resembles wild fowl in flavor, with, however, considerable inferiority. Offal-fed duck's flesh does not emit the abominable stench which issues from offal-fed pork. When live ducks are plucked, only a small quantity of down and feathers should be taken from each wing.

The house

6743. Decoys for wild ducks. Wild ducks, and other aquatic birds, are frequently taken by the device termed a decoy, which, in the low parts of Essex, and some other marshy districts, may be considered as connected with husbandry. A decoy is a canal or ditch, provincially pipe, of water (fig. 723.), with a grassy sloping margin (1) at its junction with a river or larger piece of water (8), to invite aquatic fowls to sit on and dress their plumage; but in other parts, covered with rushes and aquatic plants for concealment. Along the canal of the decoy are placed reed fences (2, 2), to conceal the decoy-man and his dogs from the sight of the ducks. There is an opening in this fence (3), where the decoy-man first shows himself to the birds to force them to take the water; and having taken it, the dog drives them up the canal, the man looking through the fence at different places (4, 5, 6) to frighten them forward, At the end of the canal is a tunnel net (7), where the birds are finally taken. In operating with this trap, as the wild duck is a very shy bird, and delights in retirement, the first step is to endeavor to make the given water a peaceful asylum, by suffering the ducks to rest on it undisturbed. The same love of concealment leads them to be partial to waters whose margins abound with underwood and aquatic plants; hence, if the given water is not already furnished with these appendages, they must be provided; for it is not retirement alone which leads them into these recesses, but a search after food also. At certain