WHAT "FANCY POINTS" ARE. 



175 



according to any insight permitted us,* and it is 

 in this way only that remedy can be found , but 

 we can remember no instance in which Mr. 

 Tegetmeier, previous to these wholesale attacks, 

 had done anything in actual detail to remedy 

 mistakes, in stereotyping which he had such a 

 considerable share. 



The same general truth about " fancy " 

 points may be illustrated from another — the 

 e-^aggerated combs so prevalent in Minorcas, 

 Spanish, and Leghorns, which, in a 

 Exaggerated majority of cases, involves either 

 Combs. whole or partial sterility in breeding 



males, and impairs health and laying 

 in the females. This is known now, and there 

 is no longer " mystery " about it, as some 

 fanciers seem to think. The hen or pullet is 

 practically blinded on one side, and in both 

 sexes the weight is too great for the brain, 

 causing brain-fatigue, and often headache, which 

 exhausts the nervous energy and so impairs the 

 sexual vigour. But most of the special laying 

 breeds have large combs, and it was believed 

 by all the old fanciers, and is still thought by 

 many, that to breed for the largest combs was 

 to breed for the best layers also; this opinion 

 came out very strongly in a discussion on the 

 subject in 1899. The point was, therefore, not 

 a " mere fancy " one to the early breeders : they 

 regarded it as a " utility " point ; and it was 

 they, not present breeders, who gave that shape 

 and bias to the standards originally, from good 

 motives. Before Minorcas were an exhibition 

 variety, we have seen combs on some as large 

 as any seen now. In spite of all these things, 

 however, Mr. Edward Brown once distinctly 

 stated,! as the result of many observations and 

 inquiries, that in consequence of the improved 

 stock on English farms, obtained from the 

 " fanciers " in every case, the laying average on 

 British farms generally had increased between 

 the years 1890 and 1900 to the extent of at 

 least twenty eggs per annum for each fowl. 



The want ol basis for such indiscriminate 

 censures is well shown in Mr. Tegetmeier's 

 statements about Dorkings. These, he main- 

 tains, were spoilt by Mr. Douglas 

 crossing them with a Malay cock, 

 causing coarseness and " loss of 

 table qualities." The Cuckoo, he 

 one of the best and earliest to 

 fatten, but went " out of fashion " for various 

 reasons ; the extra toe, supposed to be an 

 indispensable characteristic, is a mere de- 



* Thus, we had protested against the disastrous changes in 

 English Brahmas, and against the awards that produced them, 

 years before any one else drew attention to the subject. 



^ Journal Royal Agricultural Society, December, 1900. 



The Case 



of 

 Dorkings. 



says, was 



formity and a " considerable drawback from 

 a utilitarian point of view " ; and the 

 Silver Greys, by breeding for feather, " have 

 lost the hardihood and plumpness they origin- 

 ally derived from the Game." Finally he quotes 

 Mr. Cresswell (in 1881) as witness to the "long 

 legs, dark feet, want of breast, and other defects 

 which have long been the trouble of the real 

 Dorking fancier." It so happens that Mr. 

 Cresswell himself, in the paper above referred 

 to, mentions the Dorking specifically as a breed 

 which has been, beyond doubt, much improved 

 bv many years of breeding for exhibition, and 

 at the Reading Poultry Conference in 1907 here- 

 iterated that statement ! He has seen both Whites 

 and Silver Greys developed from poor layers 

 into excellent ones, and from delicate birds into 

 hardy ones, under his own breeding, whilst at 

 the same time he was improving colour ; this 

 same whiteness of colour being shown, by his 

 experience, to be a sign of freedom from ten- 

 dencies to liver disease. These two are the 

 specially " fancy " varieties of the Dorking, if 

 any. On the grey or coloured we have already 

 quoted Madame Ailleroit, and could cite any 

 number more, that better fowls for the table 

 never existed, if properly reared % ; and the 

 " fancy " extra toe, so far from being the work 

 of exhibitors, comes down to us, and is described 

 as a mark of the " best " fowls, from the days of 

 the Roman Columella I It was the " fanciers " 

 who cried out against dark and long shanks, 

 and brought back short legs and white feet as 

 " points " to be insisted upon ; but these faults 

 were not produced by Mr. Douglas's cross, not 

 occurring till many years after that ; while the 

 cross itself was not a Malay, but a bird from. 

 India of the Dorking type in all but the extra 

 toe — probably a cross between an English 

 Dorking and some local fowl of the Chittagong 

 kind. Lastly, the Cuckoo variety is a good 

 witness. We never heard of a class for it but 

 thrice in thirty years' experience, and it has 

 never been taken up by fanciers at all ; it 

 ought to be the best, therefore, according to- 

 all this reasoning. On the direct contrary, just 

 because it has lacked the support and stimulus 

 of exhibition, it is the poorest and most back- 

 ward, and difficult even to find. 



The Cuckoo Dorking, and its fate without 

 the fancier's help, also brings out well the great 

 service of exhibitions and breeders : They have 

 preserved breeds and made them known. The 



X On the other hand, it is remarkable to find it stated in 

 Wingfield and Johnson's Poultry Book of 1S53, of Dorkings, 

 that "as bad specimens of that family as of any other have 

 presented themselves in every guise at our repasts.'' They 

 were not all good fowls even then ! 



