42 BOAED OP AGRICULTURE. [Jan., 



times a giddy young creature will refuse to sit at all unless she can 

 have her nest where she at first selected it outside the sitting-room, 

 and we find her at all hours of the day and night wandering ahout 

 the room, defying authority or persuasion. Such are soon taught 

 better manners by a few days' coohng in an out-door coop in soli- 

 tary confinement with only " bread (wheat) and water." At first 

 the hens need close watching at about noon, when they all come 

 off to feed; but they soon learn to go wherever they find an unoc- 

 cupied nest. If others are added to this flock after the first week 

 more care is necessary to keep them on their own nests, as a hen 

 knows best how long she can safely leave her nest at the different 

 stages of incubation, and to put a hen that has been sitting two 

 days on eggs that have been covered two weeks or moi'e would 

 almost insure the death from chill of the chick in the shell. For 

 a few days the hen can remain off a long time, but as the twenty- 

 first day draws near her periods of recreation are much shorter, 

 and a sensible hen will not leave her nest after hearing the first 

 peep. 



If an egg is broken in any nest and the remaining ones become 

 soiled, they must be carefully washed in warm water, or the coat- 

 ing of egg will stop the pores of the shell and smother the chick. 

 The nests are examined daily to see if all is right. One restless 

 hen will often cause much trouble in this way. As the season 

 advances and the air becomes dry it is best to sprinkle the eggs 

 and hay towards night slightly with warm water twice ; first about 

 the fourteenth day and again the eighteenth or nineteenth. This 

 softens the shell and so moistens the atmosphere that the lining 

 will not dry upon the chick before it has time to release itself. 



If possible a roomf all of hens is set at the same time, as it takes 

 little longer to care for twenty than for five. When the chicks 

 begin to hatch they are removed from the hen as soon as dry, into 

 a basket lined on the bottom with paper, and are covered closely 

 with a woolen cloth, and set by the fire. We once placed fifty in 

 a corn basket and put it by the kitchen stove, and after an hour's 

 absence, returned to find the fire increased and the poor things 

 nearly smothered to death. They are kept in the basket two or 

 three days until their mother, or some other hen, is ready to 

 receive them into the coop. They will begin to eat on the second 

 day, and this early handling does much to make them tractable. 



The first foe that confronts us is the large brown louse from the 



