262 THE COMMON GUINEA FOWL 



grassy roadways are useful, and free adults somewhat helpful in 

 destroying ground pests and for disposing of aerial ones dislodged 

 by wind or shaken down by the grower. Where low bush fruits, 

 however, are grown, fowls help themselves to berries, of which they 

 are little less fond than of insects, and must therefore be withdrawn 

 before the " poults " are of such size as to be capable of mischief. In 

 gardens and vegetable grounds domestic fowls are out of place, 

 as they always scratch in the wrong place, consume almost every 

 kind of crop, and delight, even as chickens, in such plants as 

 young onions, succulent lettuces, etc. 



GUINEA-FOWL (Numida Meleagris), Fig. 145. The guinea-fowl 

 belongs to the pheasant family or Phasianidae. Its name is due to 

 the circumstance that birds of this genus are common in Guinea, 



FIG. 145. THE COMMON GUINEA-FOWL. 



and its generic name is derived from the fact that the Romans 

 called this bird the Numidian fowl. The Greeks applied the name 

 Meleagris to this bird, not to the turkey, as Ray, Aldovrandi, and 

 others erroneously supposed; therefore has been selected as the 

 specific name of the common guinea-fowl. 



The common guinea-fowl has a slate-coloured plumage covered 

 with round white spots, which the Greeks fabled to be the tears 

 shed on the death of Meleager by his sisters, who were changed 

 by Artemis into guinea-fowls. It is about the size of a cock, noisy 

 and quarrelsome in disposition, hence disagreeable in the neighbour- 

 hood of dwellings. In large parks, however, where it can run 

 about in freedom, it is by no means an unpleasant bird. Its flesh 

 is succulent, and esteemed as food. About the end of May the 

 female lays in hedges and brushwood from fifteen to twenty eggs 

 of a uniform dull-reddish hue, rather smaller than those of the 

 common hen, and good to eat. Incubation lasts twenty -five 

 days, but the guinea-fowl is a bad sitter ; therefore its eggs are 



