248 TRANSACTIONS OF THE AMERICAN INSTITUTE, 



The best kind of tapioca is made from this tuber. Its taste raw 

 is like chestnuts, but not so sweet. I am cultivating this plant. 

 I do not think it belongs to the genus DoUchus, but probably is 

 Pachyrhyzias. I am cultivating a great many plants common 

 here which may prove useful in the United States, particularly 

 beans; their name is legion." 



Poultry — Information Wanted. 



Mr. N. C. Meeker. — Here is a gentleman from Oneida county, 

 who wants information about poultry keeping, whether the busi- 

 ness can be successfully carried on upon a large scale. 



Mr. Solon Robinson said that every attempt of that kind in this 

 country had proved a lamentable failure. 



Dr. Crowell said he had seen a very large establishment near 

 Paris, which contained two hundred thousand young chickens at 

 the time he visited it. These birds, old and young, were all fed 

 upon maggots. Dead horses and other waste animal matter were 

 procured in which the maggots were produced. 



Another gentleman said he had lately seen it stated that this 

 great French establishment, about which so much had been pub- 

 lished, had proved as complete a failure as any which had been 

 attempted in this country. A friend of his who had visited Paris 

 the past season, exerted himself to find it without success. 



The Secretary said that the last volume of the Transactions of 

 the Royal Agricultural Society of England contains an extensive 

 account of poultry breeding upon a large scale. 



Mr. William S. Carpenter said Warren Leland keeps a thousand 

 or more fowls together in Westchester county, which are fed upon 

 oats from the Metropolitan Hotel; and that the poultry business 

 is successful and profitable. A skillful man is employed to attend 

 to it. Generally speaking, people keep too many cocks with their 

 hens. I have only two for seventy hens, which are sufficient. 



The Chairman made the following statement: I wintered twenty- 

 four hens and two cocks. I have now about seventy hens and 

 thirty ducks. The entire feed for all these fowls has cost thirty- 

 two dollars. From January G to May 23, I received 1,744 eggs, 

 the market value of which was iifty-seven dollars and eighteen 

 cents, though none were sold. I used and gave awaj' the whole. 

 One man who was sick during that time, ate but little else, and 

 thinks these eggs saved his life. 



Mr. N. C. Meeker. — I have been traveling for seven vears in 



