1 22 A new Method of rearing VouUry. 



would, if generally adopted, lower the price of butchers' 

 meat, and thereby be of essential benetit to the community 

 at large. I keep a large stock of poultry, which are re- 

 gularly fed in a morning upon steamed potatoes chopped 

 small, and at noon they have barley ; they are in high con- 

 dition, tractable, and lav a very great quantity of eggs. 

 In the poultry-yard is a small building, siu)ilar to a pigeon 

 cote, for the hens to lay in, with frames covered with net to 

 slide before each nest : the house is dry, light, and well 

 ventilated, kept free from dirt by having the nests and walls 

 white-washed two or three times a year, and the floor co- 

 vered once a week with fresh ashes. When 1 wish to procure 

 chickens, I take the opportunity of setting many hens to- 

 gether, confining each to her respective nest 5 a boy attends 

 morning and evening to let any ofi' that appear restless, and 

 to see that they return to their proper places : when they 

 hatch, the chickens ai^e taken away, and a second lot of 

 eggs allowed them to set again, by which means they pro- 

 duce as numerous a brood as belore, I put the chickens 

 into long wicker cages, placed against a hot wall at the 

 back of the kitchen fire_, and within them have artificial 

 mothers for the chickens to run under; they arc made simi- 

 lar to those described by Monsieur Reaumur, in his " Art 

 defaire cclorre et d' clever en toiites Sa'isonsdes Oisemix domes - 

 tiques de loufes Especes," &c., in two volumes, printed at 

 Paris, 1751 : they are made of boards about ten inches broad, 

 and fifteen inches long, su^tported by two feet in the front 

 four inches in height, and by a board at the back two 

 inches in height. The roof and back are lined with lambs' 

 skins dressed with the wool upon ihcm. The roof is thicklv 

 perforated with holes for the heated air to escape ; they are 

 formed without bottoms, and have a flannel curtain in front 

 and at the ends for the chickens to run under, which they 

 do apparently by instinct. The cages are kept perfectly dry 

 and clean with sand or moss. The above is a proper size for 

 fifty or sixty new-hatched chickens, but as they increase in 

 size they of course require a larger mother. When they 

 are a week old, and the weather fine, the boy carries them 

 and their artificial mother to the grass-plot, nourishes and 



keeps 



