534 Feeding Turkeijs, Geese, and Ducks for the London Market. 



go in their feathers to the London salesmen ; but the wives of the 

 smaller farmers take them picked to Norwich and sell them in 

 the market, where very large ones, trussed and ready for the 

 spit, have made Is. 6d. at Christmas. Hen birds, which get fat 

 sooner and are generally killed off before the end of November, 

 are thought to be a daintier morsel than the " gobblers." Some 

 two-year old cocks (beyond v/hich age they are very seldom kept) 

 have been killed at 30 lbs., when a heavy weight is wanted for an 

 audit dinner; but with very high feeding, in one or two rare 

 instances, prize birds have turned the scale at 40 lbs. 



It is to Norfolk and Suffolk that we look for goose management 

 on the largest and most economical scale. The goose trade of 

 the great Norfolk dealers resolves itself into two branches, — the 

 green geese and the Michaelmas. In March and April they begin 

 to get in their gosling supplies from farmers or cottagers near 

 the commons in both those counties. Most of these goslings are 

 about five weeks old, and many of them in very poor plight ; but 

 six or seven weeks of feeding under stages, on barleymeal, maize, 

 wheat-tailings, and brewers'-grains mixed, make them all ripe 

 for the green-goose market. The Michaelmas geese take their 

 places under the stages in August, and Norfolk and Suffolk are 

 pretty well scoured before the dealers fall back upon the Irish and 

 the Dutch supplies. The Dutch, which are principally grey, 

 come from Rotterdam, and one of the largest Norwich dealers 

 imported 17 tons' weight of live birds last year. They come over 

 by steamers and sailing-vessels, packed in big flat baskets, but 

 not to any great extent after the 1st of October. In the dealers' 

 hands they are are fed on the same principle as ducks — low fare 

 to begin with, and then on a gradually ascending scale. On 

 turnips they are capital substitutes for sheep, and when a dealer 

 has a turnip- field he not unfrequently hurdles off a portion of it 

 and eats it off with them. They first clear the tops and then the 

 bulbs of the softer turnips ; but when they have a field of swedes 

 to deal with, the man in attendance gives each turnip a chop. 

 With this aid they eat far cleaner than sheepj and, in fact, leave 

 nothing but their " taith," which answers admirably as a prepara- 

 tion for the next wheat-crop. Mangolds are not so much to their 

 taste as turnips, but they eat the tops with a special relish. While 

 they are busy with these green crops they require nothing but 

 large troughs of water, and the finishing process consists in 

 putting them under stages for a month, and feeding them on 

 brewers'-grains and meal. 



On the Western moors of Cornwall every one keeps geese, and 

 they are bought up by jobbers in thousands for the stubbles. 

 Summer Court on September 25th is the " goose fair " of the 

 county ; but they are only eaten there, and bargains are struck 



