CHAPTER XXVII. 



ARTIFICIAL INCUBATIOK. 



The practice of this art reaches back to the dawn of 

 history. The oldest written accounts are connected with 

 Egypt. In "The Voiage and Travaile of Sir John Man- 

 deville, Kt," occurs the following, written in 1356 : 



"Also at Cayre (Cairo), that I spake of before, sellen men, comounly 

 men and women of other lawe, as we done here bestes in the market. 

 And there is a common hows in that cytee that is all fulle of smale 

 furneys; and thidre bryngen wornmen of the toun here eyren (eggs) of 

 hennes, of gees, and of dokes, for to ben put in to the furneyses. And 

 the! that kepen that hows covern hem with hate of hors dong, and 

 outen henne, goos or doke or any other foul; and at the ende of three 

 weeks or a monethe, thei comen agen and taken here chickens and 

 norissche hem and bryngen hem forthe, so that alle thecountre is fulle 

 of hem. And so men don there bothe wyntre and somer." 



The fact of the successful prosecution of this art in 

 Egypt having become disseminated throughout Europe, 

 there were incubators of various patterns constructed in 

 France, England and other countries, from the middle 

 of the fifteenth to the close of the eighteenth century. 

 In 1777, a method of heating egg ovens by pipes of hot 

 water was tried in France, according to that excellent 

 work, "Incubation and its Natural Laws," by Charles 

 A. Cyphers, the best which has appeared since the modern 

 incubators came in use, outside of the standard works 

 on embryology. To John Champion, Berwick-on- 

 Tweed, England, 1770, probably belongs the credit of 

 first hatching eggs by the aid of fire. He used a room 

 through which passed two heated flues, the eggs being 

 placed on a large round table in the center. He claimed 

 that as many of the eggs hatched as if they had 



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