The Evidence from Sexual Characters. 223 



the feathers of the hen, he retains all his courage and 

 high spirit. 



la a few cases the females of allied breeds differ more 

 than the males, and Darwin refers to two strains of 

 black-breasted red games, in which the cocks were so 

 much alike that they could not be distinguished, while 

 the hens were partridge-brown in the one case and fawn- 

 brown in the other. The pencilling which is character- 

 istic of the Hamburg hen is almost absent in the male, 

 but as a rule the various breeds of fowls are distinguished 

 by peculiarities of organs which are almost or entirely 

 confined to the males. 



Of the comb Darwin says that it differs much in the 

 various breeds, and its form is eminently characteristic 

 of each kind with the exception of the Dorkings. A 

 single deeply serrated comb is the typical and most 

 common form. It differs much in size, being immense- 

 ly developed in Spanish fowls; and in a local breed called 

 Eedcaps, it is sometimes upwards of three inches in 

 breadth at the front, and more than four inches in length, 

 measured to the end of the peak behind. In some breeds 

 the comb is double, and when the two ends are cemented 

 together it forms a "cap comb;" in the "rose comfy" 

 it is depressed, covered with small projections, and pro- 

 duced backwards; in the horned and Creve-Cceur fowl it 

 is produced into two horns; it is triple in the pea-combed 

 Brahmas, short and truncated in the Malays, and absent 

 in the Guelderlands. In the tasselled game a few long 

 feathers arise from the back of the comb, and in many 

 breeds a crest of feathers replaces the comb. The crest, 

 when little developed, arises from a fleshy mass, but 

 when much developed, form a hemispherical protuber- 

 ance of the skull. In the best Polish fowls it is so 

 largely developed that the birds can hardly pick up their 



