G A L L I N I D M. 



573 



to defy him to raise his voice higher than his own. 

 This emulous cry, repeated by all the cocks of a 

 village, on an obscure night, has often struck the ear 

 of the wandering traveller, and proved the happy 

 means of directing him to the right road. It is very 

 generally imagined that the cock is not designed by 

 nature to share in the solicitudes of incubation and 

 the education of the young ; but on a little more 

 closely examining matters, we are forced to relinquish 

 this opinion, at least as a habit to which there are no 

 exceptions. 



This leads us to a remarkable peculiarity in the 

 physiology of these animals. It has been known from 

 very remote antiquity, that changing the male bird of 

 this species into what is called a capon, by depriving 

 him of his sexual powers, greatly improves the quality, 

 and even the quantity of his flesh. This is general 

 in the case of mutilated male animals, provided the 

 mutilation takes place at that early period of life 

 when the external indications of sex have not yet dis- 

 played themselves, and the bird is in that state which 

 may be regarded as neuter. The change which the 

 female undergoes in respect of quality of flesh when 

 it arrives at maturity, is not in any species of animal 

 so great as that in the male ; but still there is a change, 

 and the flesh of the female is neither so good nor so 

 abundant as that of the mutilated male. By pre- 

 paring the capon at this early stage, and before any 

 decided sexual character is acquired, the flesh is 

 secured in the best condition, and the operation is 

 performed with little or no risk. 



Now, the remarkable physiological part of this 

 business is, that, the capon acquires so much of the 

 disposition of the female, that he may be made to 

 attend on young chickens, and watch and nurse them 

 with all the solicitude of a hen. Experiments on this 

 subject, which were made some time ago in France, 

 are detailed by M. Parmentier, who mentions that 

 capons have been trained not only to attend chickens, 

 but to hatch eggs, an office in which the entire male 

 bird never takes any concern. A strong and active 

 capon is chosen for this purpose ; the feathers are 

 removed from the belly, he is rubbed with nettles, 

 and made intoxicated with toast and wine. For two 

 or three days this treatment is repeated, during which 

 they keep him shut up in some narrow and confined 

 place ; he is then put into a cage with two or three 

 chickens, which feed with him, hide under his belly, 

 ami, by their down, calm the smarts which the pullin 

 of the feathers and the nettles have occasioned. He 

 grows attached to them in a very short time, and calls 

 them back when they quit him. Their number is 

 augmented daily until he has as many as the volume 

 of his body and the amplitude of his wings will cover 

 As soon as the intended number is completed, he 

 must be left two days longer with them in a large 

 cage, and then permitted to proceed forth conducting 

 his flock, and he will prove as careful and attentive to 

 them as the most assiduous female. Capons do not 

 undergo the annual change in their plumage as other 

 birds. Their voice loses its strength and clearness 

 they seldom attempt to make it heard, and are 

 very melancholy and sad in their disposition. They 

 are treated with great severity by the cocks, and the) 

 are held in detestation by the hens. They woulc 

 very speedily fall a sacrifice to the persecutions o 

 their companions, if they were not withdrawn to fulfi 

 the object of their destiny by man, who has degrade( 

 them for his own purposes! This object is simply to 



at, drink, and sleep, that they may get fat as soon 

 r possible for the use of the table, as they themselves 

 can have no enjoyment in the matter. Sometimes 

 lens are caponed as well as cocks, and the flavour of 

 heir flesh is very much improved in consequence. 

 The epicurism of man has suggested various modes 

 of fattening fowls excessively, all which are unnatural, 

 and more or less cruel. The result, in fact, is 

 always to produce disease, and more particularly of 

 the liver. All those artificial modes of forcing animals 

 nto unnatural states either of general fat, or of the 

 growth of some particular organ, are the results of 

 vitiated tastes, and were more common in the dark 

 and barbarous ages than they are now. There is a 

 aw which runs through the whole economy of those 

 living creatures which are used as human food, and 

 from that law there appears to be no deviation. It is 

 this : No animal can furnish healthy food for man 

 unless it is itself healthy at the time when it is pre- 

 pared as food. Hence, those who violate this law, 

 and seek to gratify a depraved luxury by bringing 

 on disease in that which they eat, certainly lay, in 

 this misguided sacrifice to the lowest of their animal 

 appetites, a sure foundation for disease in themselves, 

 and bitter repentance when it is too late. 



In many parts of the world, especially in Egypt, 

 and partially in France, and there is no doubt that it 

 could easily be practised in any country, chickens are 

 hatched by artificial heat in ovens, and reared by 

 human care. This is so perfectly artificial a matter, 

 that it forms no part whatever of Natural History, 

 further than as it shows that after the mature egg is 

 dropped, the real labour of the parent-bird is at an 

 end ; and that both substantively and actively, in so 

 far as the egg is concerned, it contains all that is 

 requisite for the development of the new being, and 

 wants only the action of any heat, of the proper de- 

 gree, to bring it to maturity. As this is, perhaps, the 

 only opportunity which we may have of adverting to 

 the progress of the development of the young of a 

 bird, which is a curious matter, we shall here take a 

 very rapid glance at it. 



The germ, or as it is called, the cicatricula, in the 

 recent egg, and before incubation, is very small. It 

 is placed on the surface of the spheroid of the yolk ; 

 and, by a peculiar structure of the egg, it always 

 keeps the upper side, in what situation soever the egg 

 may be placed. The white of the egg is much less 

 susceptible of putridity than the yolk, or rather than 

 the membrane in which the yolk is enclosed ; and if, 

 from the egg's lying long in one position, the yolk 

 descends till the membrane comes wholly, or very 

 nearly into contact with the shell, an action is apt to 

 be excited in the membrane, different from the living 

 action that commences in the cicatricula ; and as 

 every action in a living body or a germ of life, be it 

 of which kind it may, which is not a living action, is 

 an action of death and putridity, the life of the egg 

 may be destroyed by this means ; and it may give 

 out that odour of sulphuretted hydrogen, which is so 

 very noxious. This may happen in the process of 

 hatching, as well as in an unmatched egg ; for if the 

 action of the membrane is too much for that of the 

 embryo chicken, the life may be extinguished at the 

 very time that it is just beginning to develop itself 

 Hence, hens, especially in the earlier stages of their 

 sitting, are observed to turn their eggs, or if they do 

 not this, the chance is, that some of the number will 

 be addled and produce nothing. 



