May 2, 1872. ] 



JOURNAL OF HOETICULTUEE AND COTTAGE GAEDENER. 



377 



Silver- Greys, and Any other variety, iiTespective of sex, and 

 the best of these receives the other cuj). The entry fee, 2s. Gd., 

 is in proportion to the px^izes, and the Rabbits are to be shown 

 as single pens. 



AMONG THE CLEAR JONQUES. 



{Concluded from page 257.) 



Thex into the open countiy where, in a garden at the back of 

 a snug little hoxise, was a nondescript sort of building, a wooden 

 erection with double walls filled in with sawdust. The interior 

 was lined with cages, leaving barely space to turn round in. 

 Every " mew " bore a small label corresponding to divers num- 

 bers in the last Crystal Palace catalogue, which had been en- 

 riched to a considerable extent by the contents of the little 

 wooden house. One pair here I coveted, but I came away 

 without them. If this should meet the eye of the owner of the 

 " sawdust xiMsL " I hope it may piick his conscience. 



Then further onto where the m^usic fi'omthe open door of every 

 pretty cottage told how general is the fancy among the artisans, 

 the nature of whose daily labour confines them to their own 

 homes. Into more houses — pictures of cleanliness, tidiness, and 

 comfort ; up more lighthouse stairs and into two more breeding 

 rooms, from which I came away vnih gems intended to stock 

 the cages of the fancy eighteen thousand miles from home. 



And then still fui'ther on to a breeder of thirty years' stand- 

 ing. He expected me, and a right cordial greeting I got from 

 him. It was getting on towards evening when Mr. Mackley 

 drove me to his door, and tea being on the table the condition 

 was that we had to attend to that before seeing the birds. My 

 connection "viith the Canary has introduced me to strange scenes 

 and many people. I am indebted to him for some of my most 

 valued friendships, and if I have endeavoured in my small way 

 to introduce him as a pleasant and instructive companion into 

 circles in which he was perhaps only imperfectly undei-stood, he 

 has amply repaid me by bringing me in contact with some I, in 

 all probability, should never have known but for the interven- 

 tion of his kindly services. I have been spoken of as an authority 

 on the other side of the Atlantic, and published in the South 

 Pacific, and sometimes begin to thing myself somebody. But 

 my round of calls last week, and, not least, my visit to the 

 humble cottage of Mr. , took a large per-centage of the con- 

 ceit out of me. By the time I arrived at his little establishment 

 I also arrived at the conclusion that it is just possible to be a 

 general fancier and have a fair, general, all-round knowledge ; 

 that one may, year after year, see all the best birds of the season, 

 and still have a deal to learn. In fact, I felt myself very small. 

 'What a wonderful thing is knowledge of any kind, be it ever so 

 tumble, and on what a pedestal stands the man who has the 

 know ! So I thought when I stood before the cages from which 

 had issued some of the finest birds the Crystal Palace ever saw. 

 Of course our chat was essentially bird talk, and on my asking 

 our host if he had ever seen a well-knowu bird, one never beaten, 

 the champion of his year, he pointed with some pride to one of 

 his cages and said, "He came out of that mew," and taking 

 down a pair, and putting them in my store cage added, " and 

 now you have got his brother ! " I got into Mr. Mackley's gig a 

 happy man. 



The members of the " Alliance " mustered in force that night 

 ^t the " Woolpack." It was not club night, hut the elect were 

 to the fore in numbers. Many a foaming tankard of old Norwich 

 ale was placed on the table, and "toasts," "sentiments," and 

 *' harmony " were the order of the day. The President of the 

 Club, a right jovial soul withal, gave us a song in which we were 

 requested to listen to his light guitar ; and the chorus, " fal-lal- 

 lal-la, fal-lal-lal-la, fal-lal-lal-li-day," was something immense, 

 conveying a true idea of the capabihties of that instrument. 

 Another gentleman who said he had won a cup in a singing 

 m,atch, and would produce it if desired, informed us in a rich 

 tenor that his barque was skimmiug the ccean, and that he in- 

 tended to conduct his business on free trade principles in defi- 

 ance of the customs or excise, and announced straight from the 

 chest, with a disregard of his larynx indicative of a true free- 

 booter, that he was the " Smug-gler King ! "' A third chanted 

 in dolorous tones how he had loved only once, but that the object 

 of his affections having died was buried in some secluded spot, 

 so deep that he didn't expect to see her anymore. Another 

 sang that the winds might blow as they ijleased, from " sou'-sou'- 

 northe," or any other quarter, it was a matter of indifference to 

 him. He called upon the music to play, for he intended to start 

 next morning by the first train to cross the ragiu' main, and a 

 roamin' go thousands of miles away beyond the bounds of 

 our geographical knowledge. So closed another scene in my 

 Canary life, with a general shaking of hands and good wishes 

 from as well-meaning a set of men as I have met with in the 

 ^great fancy. — W. A. Blakstox. 



is decidedly in favour of large hives. On first commencing bee- 

 keeping, sixteen years ago, I had some boxes made 10 inches, 

 and others nearly 12 inches square inside. I anticipated that 

 the small hives would become crowded, and consequently be 

 prepared to send out swarms earlier than the larger boxes. In 

 this I was completely deceived, as I found, after some years' ex- 

 perience, that the large hives become crowded and produced 

 drones quite as soon as the smaller boxes ; and when storified, 

 the supers over the 12-inch boxes were filled as rapidly as those 

 over the smaller ones, the supers in each case con-esponding in 

 size ^^ith the stocks over which they were placed. 



Breeding Regulated ix a Great Measure by the Size 

 AND Population of the Hlv'e. — When honey is abundant the 

 laying of a queen of average fertilit}* is much restricted by her 

 inability to find empty cells into which to deposit her eggs ; but 

 in rainy bad honey seasons the population uf a hive increases 

 with most astonishing rapidity, as cells which would in ordinary 

 cuTumstances be filled with honey become cradles for young 

 bees. "When the queen of a populous stock is supplied with a 

 succession of empty brood combs in summer they are filled with 

 eggs with marvellous and almost incredible rapidity, and so far 

 from finding breeding restricted to the interior frames of a ten- 

 frame Woodbury hive, I have generally found all the frames 

 almost entirely occupied with brood during the early part of 

 summer (unless honey has been very abundant), as well as the 

 combs of a large nadir. If a lull occurs in the honey harvest, 

 my supers are also generally visited by the queen in spite of 

 contracted entrances, and most of the combs are more or less 

 disfigxu-ed with brood, so that I have frequently been compelled 

 to examine all the combs in the supers to excise any brood 

 which has been deposited in them. 



AuTUMX.iL Unions .are Useful. — Most of my hives are de- 

 voted to storifying, but I annually raise three or four swarms 

 to try to rear pure ItaUan queens. The best queens are kept 

 and placed at the heads of stocks in the autumn, from which 

 any inferior queens have been removed, and as I never increase 

 my number of stock beyond vei*y moderate Umits, the bees are 

 joined to the old stocks. To prevent all risk to the queens, they 

 are always secured in a queen-cage before the junction of the 

 bees is effected, and on the day after junction an inspection at 

 once enables me to decide whether the bees are favourably 

 disposed or otherwise towards the impnsoned queen. As I 

 remove one of the queens before joining two stocks, I have 

 always found the captive well received when set at Ubei-ty. 

 Although few of the l.iee> thus added to a stock live to do much 

 in the way of collecting,' honey in the follo^-ing spring, still it 

 will be found that they liave proved most beneficial to the hive 

 by increasing the pojnilation in the winter and early spring, as 

 the queen is thus enabled to extend the sphere of her operations, 

 and brood is reared in proportion to the extent of comb occupied 

 by the bees, and the old worn-out members of the community 

 are thus succeeded by young bees who cany on the work of the 

 hive into the summer. — J. E. B., Wolverhampton. 



APIAEIAN NOTES. 

 L.vRGE versus Small Hn-ES. — It is impossible to lay down a 

 rule appUcable to all locaUties ; my own experience, "however, 



OUR LETTER BOX. 



Bhahma Hens Dying {li. F.). — There seems to be nothing in your feeding 

 or treatment that can explain why yom- fowls die, and we therefore believe 

 they have access to something that is fatal to them. It may be a fun^^us, 

 some berries, or com that has been dressed with arsenic for sowing. Cut 

 grass is useless; fowls will not eat it. Yoa write as though they seldom had 

 green food; it is essential to their well-doing at this time of year. Cut some 

 hea\-y sods with plenty of grass on them ; you will find they eat them eagerly. 

 Your fowls do not seem to be in a healthy natural state. They do not, 

 according to your account, perform their functions naturally. Do you over- 

 feed ? Vk'e advise you to feed less on com and kitchen scraps, and to give 

 more green food. "We ^all be surprised if short commons do not overcome 

 the drowsy symptoms, "^e expect they die very fat ; that is, in the laying 

 season, conducive to disease and death. If you can find or think of no 

 cause for these deaths, then we believe you must attribute them to over- 

 feeding, diseased liver, and consequent obesity. In fowls, as in human 

 beings, there are five thousand deaths from overfeeding to one from starva- 

 tion. We therefore advise you to diminish the quantity of food. If that do 

 not succeed you must write again. If your system will make pullets lay for 

 months without becoming broody, and without injury to their health, you 

 have made a discovery that is worth patenting. 



Chickens Defoem:ed (G. Slade). — Where chickens are hatched with de- 

 formed legs and feet, it is hereditary ; but it is very rare for them to be 

 hatched so. As a rule they are hatched perfect, if the parents are so. 

 Nothing brings on defective' feet and legs so surely as improper flooring in 

 the place where they are brought up. Brick, wood, or stone flooring, all spoil 

 the feet of chickens. They are always cold and damp, thus causing disease 

 and swelling of the knee-joint. From their unyielding snrfaco they cause 

 flat splay feet, and prevent the wholesome practice of scratching. In our 

 experience of poultry breeding we have never seen a defect spreading through 

 a particular run without tracing it. after close examination, to one of the 

 parents. We believe you will do the same, and that a search among the 

 parents will account for the deformity of the offspring. Should it be so, do 

 away with the offender, and huiTj the faulty chickens on, that they may 

 render satisfactory sen-ice on table in the hot summer. Let them live and 

 roost on an eaithen floor. 



Hens Carrying Eggs.—" In Our Letter Box (April 18), in answer to 

 'Ten Years Old,' it is stated that 'We do not beheve in then- [i.e., fowls] 

 power to lift or carry an egg anvwhere.' The other day the boy who looks 

 after my poultry to'ld me that he had seen a Turkey hen descend from a 

 quantitv of old wood, rails, and other lumber, imder a large open shed, where 



