SILVER WYANDOTTES MATING. 19 



Another important point to bear in mind is the evil of continued 

 in-and-in breeding. The majority of old fanciers know its bad effects, 

 and seldom venture too far. On this point, all practical stock breed- 

 ers, as well as the medical faculty, agree, that the ultimate tendency of 

 breeding in-and-in is highly injurious; that when carried to excess 

 it will always result in a loss of constitutional vigor and hardiness 

 in the offspring, if not to the verge of sterility and impotency; that 

 while its tendency may be in the direction of fineness of texture, 

 lightness of bone, smoothness of plumage and limbs, neatness and 

 uniformity of parts, it is invariably at the expense of stamina, robust- 

 ness, strength and prepotent power. These things do not occur to 

 the novice when he embarks in poultry culture; perhaps he does 

 not give it a thought. He may be willing to abide by the apparent 

 improvement which in-breeding stamps upon its issue, but he may 

 not take into consideration that that improvement is wisely " im- 

 proving his stock off the face of the earth," to make room for a 

 more vigorous and hardier race. 



Breeders are prone to place too much reliance on the male, and 

 apt to overlook or entirely ignore requisite qualities in the female. 

 It puzzles us to know by what art or course of breeding, either in 

 oviparous or mammiferous animals, the male is so vastly superior to 

 the female, in its part of stamping high and desirable merits. Sci- 

 ence will refuse its assent to this unphilosophic hypothesis. Every 

 day we hear some writer exclaim, " The cock is half the pen." He 

 believes it; he has a right to his opinion; he formed it while breed- 

 ing fowls, or has accepted it as gospel truth, because somebody 

 else had said it, in whose judgment he places great reliance. 



Our study of the laws of breeding leads us to the conclusion that 

 the female contributes more elements of organism and internal 

 structure than the male. The male gives the " spark of life " to the 

 inert procreated mass; that is, its potency, spirit, life and complex- 

 ion; the latter only when he is more potent in this quality, which 

 is usually noticed in crosses; stamping his own color, complexion 

 and leading characteristics with a hen of his breed is no sign of 

 potency, because the hen would have given the color and features, 

 and leading characteristics, to tr;e male progeny, with another male 

 of the same strain or variety, though perhaps in a less marked 

 degree. If the cock is half the pen, then, there would be no neces- 

 sity to select females with color, penciling, lacing, or facial append- 

 ages to modify or intensify points in the male, as is done in every 

 carefully made pen, as he would stamp all individual points regard- 



