SIL VER- PENCILLED HA MB URGHS. 



441 



endeavour to breed them to Hamburgh lines. 

 Yellow hackles should be particularly avoided, 

 breeding dull and washy chickens ; neither 

 should the black striping be too heavy. Hens 

 not rich enough in ground-colour, or with 

 spangling too much like lacing, should also be 

 discarded : such birds appear to be of the same 

 stamp as the yellow-hackled cockerels. If these 

 points are kept in mind, the Redcap, being 

 originally a coarse breed of natural sex-colours, 

 will be found to breed fairly true, and both 

 sexes from one mating. 



Pencilled Hamburghs are smaller and lighter 

 in make than the Spangled, and the Silvers and 

 Golds were formerly known in Lancashire as 



Bolton Greys and Bolton Bays re- 

 l'''^" spectively, while the Silvers were, 



Hamburghs. ^""^ ^•^''^ ^""^ sometimes, called Chit- 



tiprats. They are very obviously 

 closely allied to the somewhat larger but single- 

 combed breeds described in a subsequent 

 chapter as Campines and Braekels ; indeed, a 

 rose-combed Campine would be almost exactly 

 a Pencilled Hamburgh of fifty years ago, but 

 long breeding has reduced the size of that bird, 

 and refined the pencilling of the hens, and 

 altered that of the cocks, till the appearance of 

 both has been considerably changed. The cock 

 depicted in the early poultry books is however 

 evidently pencilled on the body, very much 

 as the Continental breeds just mentioned are 

 at this day. 



The head-points of the Silver-pencilled 

 Hamburgh cock resemble those of other 

 varieties, except in greater neatness and delicacy 

 of appearance, the comb being somewhat smaller. 

 The head, hackle, back, saddle, breast, and 

 under-parts should be a clear silvery white, free 

 from straw-colour. The true tail feathers are 

 black, the sickles and side feathers rich glossy 

 green-black up the centre, only edged with a 

 fine white lacing, as sharply defined as possible. 

 The marbling and splashing or grizzling with 

 white which once were common, is impossible 

 now for a successful bird. The wing-coverts or 

 bar-feathers are generally more or less coarsely 

 pencilled on the upper or invisible web, the tips 

 sometimes showing a slight line of black across 

 the wing ; this slight bar was once cultivated, 

 and is still allowed, but a white wing is now 

 preferred. The secondaries are also usually 

 black or coarsely pencilled on inside web, but 

 this is invisible. Formerly these feathers were 

 black on the outer web also for a narrow band 

 next the quill, but this dark colour is now 

 discouraged. The fluff on the thighs is also 

 now preferred as white as possible, whereas 



some pencilling used to be bred for there also. 

 All these changes have been in the direction 

 of breeding a whiter cock than formerly. 



The pullet's hackle also should be silvery 

 white and clear, but near the bottom is hardly 

 ever so now. The rest of the body should have 

 each feather distinctly pencilled across with 

 narrow bars of black, as distinct and clear as 

 possible upon the white ground (or in the case of 

 Golden Pencils, golden ground), and as straight 

 across the feather as possible. The pencillings 

 should show a rich green gloss, and range as 

 much as possible into lines round the body, as 

 in what are termed " ringlets " in Plymouth 

 Rocks. The finer the pencilling, and therefore 

 more numerous the bars, the better ; and the 

 marking should extend from under the throat 

 to the end of the tail. On the breast the 

 pencillings will be fewer, and under the throat 

 is a particularly weak place, very apt to come 

 merely spotted, or with horse-shoe markings : 

 but some birds are well marked even in this 

 region, though not so well as elsewhere, and 

 though the best ones are generally most marked 

 on the hackle. The fact is that breeding for 

 pencilling alone always tends to produce pencilled 

 hackle also, as we have seen already in Partridge 

 Cochins and Brahmas. The tail should be well 

 pencilled straight across, and this is not so very 

 rare in the two top feathers of the tail itself; 

 but it is curious that some pullets properly 

 pencilled there will fail in the longer tail-coverts, 

 and vice vcrsd, so that a fine all-round complete 

 tail is rather rare. 



It is in the pencilling of the pullets that most 

 change has taken place since 1870, as will be 

 seen from Figs. 127 and i.?8, the former being 

 photographed exactly the size of 

 Breeding nature from winners of the present 



PencHs ^^Y, whilst Fig. 128 exactly repre- 



sents, also of the natural size, 

 feathers supplied by Mr. Beldon in 1870. It 

 will be seen that the bars are much more 

 numerous, finer, and straighter than those of 

 thirty years before. Most writers state that the 

 black bars should only equal the light spaces in 

 width, and feathers are often drawn so : but it is 

 to be observed that such feathers are draivn, 

 never photographed, and have not been really seen 

 yet, while our photographs are taken from two 

 of the best cup-winners of the year 1900.* 

 This change has partly caused, and partly been 

 caused by, a considerable change in the method 



* Mr. Pickles had kindly supplied a full set, in duplicate ; 

 but one of the most important feathers being too much damaged 

 in transit, and such feathers being too precious at that season to 

 be plucked freely, Mr. \V. Roberts kindly supplied a substitute. 

 Except for the damage to the first, the second could scarcely 

 be distinguished. 



