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deterioration of some of the highly-bred varieties of our domes- 

 tic fowls. It has become quite a general source of complaint by- 

 many farmers in this section of the country, who in times past 

 had plenty of eggs, and to spare, from a small number of com- 

 mon fowls, that, since the origin of the mania which has happily 

 been called the " Hen Fever," they have found themselves, with 

 their improved gigantic breeds, unable to procure any thing like 

 their usual supply of eggs from the same number of birds ; and 

 that they have not only raised the birds at the expense of several 

 dollars a pound, but have been obliged to buy eggs for family 

 use. This has become such a source of annoyance and pecu- 

 niary loss that it deserves to be considered. It is a natural con- 

 sequence of forcing birds from different countries and of different 

 origins to propagate a hybrid offspring, for this very reason prone 

 to degeneration, which is increased by the impossibility of cross- 

 ing the hybrids by the supposed pure originals. The size of the 

 birds seems to be obtained in this case at the expense of the re- 

 productive powers. The admixture of different original species, 

 and breeding " in and in," have been carried beyond the limits 

 fixed by nature, and deterioration is the result. 



To ascend from birds to man — what we have seen in our 

 domestic fowls, we find occurring again in the Mulatto, and other 

 hybrid human races. 



The Mulatto is often triumphantly appealed to as a proof that 

 hybrid races are prolific without end. Every physician who has 

 seen much practice among Mulattoes knows that, in the first 

 place, they are far less prolific than the blacks or whites ; the 

 statistics of New York State and City confirm this fact of daily 

 observation ; — and, in the second place, when they are prolific, 

 the progeny is frail, diseased, short-lived, rarely arriving at robust 

 manhood or maturity ; physicians need not be told of the com- 

 paratively enormous amount of scrofulous and deteriorated con- 

 stitutions found among these hybrids. 



The Colonization Journal furnishes some statistics with regard 

 to the colored population of New York City, which must prove 

 painfully interesting to all reflecting people. The late census 

 showed that while all other classes of our population in all parts 

 of the country were increasing in an enormous ratio, the colored 



