^ AGRICULTURAL ESSAYS. 



'wT^ 1/ V"^ ^'".^"1^7 c^Penment, respecting the fattening 

 of poultry, IS from the National -Recorder. In^the winter If 

 J«l«, a gentleman in the city of New-York placed a Turkey 



Z '?on"r f°'f ^^^"'■ r^' ^'^' ^^"ff' t^'« ^e^t wide, and three 

 or four feet high. He excluded as much light as he could 

 without a circulation of air, and fed the turkey with soft brick 

 broken in pieces, vvith charcoal also broken, and with six grains 

 €f corn per day.^Fresh water was daily supplied. The^ box! 

 or coop, in which the turkey was placed,iie always locked up 

 h/t^rf^'l r^i^'Ju"'^^"^ '^^' perfectly confident that no body 

 interfered with the experiment. At the end of one month 

 tne turkey was killed, and Avas found to be filled up with fat, ' 

 / /w and entraife were dissected, and nothing was 

 ^ound but a residuum of charcoal and brick. The Turkey was 

 eaten and found to be very good. The next year he repeated 

 the experiment with the same success.* This is not mention- 

 ed as a matter of so much importance to the farmer, whogen- 



jfX^^^f^^'l''''^'''^}^^^y^^'^^^ P«"ltry; but it is an in- 

 stance of the efficacy of chemical science, in the develope- 

 ment of facts which may be of great importance in the im- 

 provement of agricultural and domestic economy. 

 _ it may, however, be an object of no minor consequence to 

 the poorer class of our citizens, to know, that in exigences oT 

 extremity, they may save their little stock of poultry by raking- 

 from their ashes the remnant of charcoal. 



It is observed in the Complete Grazier, that a spirited farm- 

 er near Liverpool, keeps a large stock ofpoultry in the same . 

 mclosure, with smgular success. He has nearly an aero en- 

 closed with a close slab fence, about seven feet high. The 



!?P u u"^ ^^ •^''^^y '^^^^^ ^^"P pointed, likl pickets, 

 though perhaps this is not necessary. Within this enclosure 

 are put up slight small sheds, well secured from rains, how- 

 ever, for the different kinds ofpoultry, and his supplied with a 

 OTiall stream of water. The poultry are regularly fed three 

 times a day with boiled potatoes, which is their only food, ex- 

 cept what grass may grow within their encloeure. The dung 



*The farmfer, or ether citizen, unacquainted with the science of 

 -chemistry, will not think this account so incredible, when thej 

 are informed, that carbon is the basis of charcoal, and that car- 

 bon IS a necessary part of sugrar of oil, &c. and Consequently en- 

 tersinto the composition of animal milk, and of animal oils and 

 ' ?at. See Parker'3 Chemistry ,^ p. 270, 



