FOR SITTERS IN MIND CLIMATES. 91 



to be replaced with fresh, or when straw cannot be had. 

 The stirring of straw with a hand fork, or digging soil 

 with a spade, on any considerable scale, is a back number. 

 If it is desired to scatter grain broadcast, a seeder car- 

 ried by the operator and worked by a small crank, as if 

 he had a coffee mill slung over his shoulders, can be 

 used, but the preferable plan is to first rake the straw 

 into a continuous winding windrow with the side deliv- 

 ery rake, and then let the driver of the hay tedder rein 

 his team with one hand and scatter grain with the other, 

 while he goes lengthwise of the windrow. When the 

 horseless carriage is perfected, substitute it for the team 

 in seeding and raking at the hatching house yards and 

 also for all operations where horses- are used in the 

 colony or itinerant plan. The motor-propelled bicycle 

 is to be utilized, besides, to afford the attendant quick 

 access to all parts of the plant. Use finely cracked corn 

 always, on or under litter at the scratching places, and 

 on feed shelves, in preference to whole grain, so as to 

 make more work for the fowls. The board rims have 

 an additional use and one which is quite important. 

 Being in the track where the sitters race back and forth 

 to find grain near the small yards, these diminutive 

 fences are jumped upon at every trip, affording wing 

 exercise. Nothing pleases a sitter better than to use her 

 wings by flying up on something, as well as her feet r 

 Not only does she secure, after her sedentary existence, 

 grateful exercise of muscles, the largest in her body, which 

 are attached to her wings ; but by the thorough airing of 

 her whole plumage her wing gymnastics give, and by the 

 disinfecting properties of the earth in which she shuffles, 

 her nest is kept sweet. Oh, nature understands her 

 business, and the first air inhaled by the younglings 

 should be altogether purer than the noisome exhalations 

 of a reeking, perspiring incubator. The whole economy 

 of incubation of any species of bird is one of the most 

 perfect and admirable things in the universe. 



