THE GAME FOWL. 265 



As food for Poultry, many things are recommended, and 

 many things are good. But of all grains, economy properly 

 considered, Indian corn is probably the best as a standard- 

 chopped for small ones, and whole or chopped for large and 

 half-grown Fowls. When made into meal, it can be mixed 

 with the surplus milk, or with the water that meat has been 

 cooked in, with great advantage. For young and growing 

 Poultry, Turkeys, Greese, Ducks, or Chickens, milk in any 

 shape, is most particularly beneficial. Fowls are very fond of 

 wheat, but it is too expensive. Oats are (or is, which say you ?) 

 light, and consequently not so cheap as they seern. One 

 bushel of corn is worth two of oats, for Poultry, and for almost 

 any thing else. As for rye, Chickens will scarcely eat it. In 

 winter, when Hens are of necessity prevented from getting 

 green food for themselves, they should be well supplied with 

 the leaves of cabbage, beets, and other vegetables, and with 

 the half-rotten apples. The very eagerness with which they 

 devour such things, after a long abstinence, is proof of their 

 utility. But of all extras for Fowls in winter, meat is the 

 most beneficial from chopped beef-steak to cheese-maggots. 

 Furnish a Hen with animal food, and occasionally something 

 verdant, put her in comfortable lodgings, where water and 

 pebble-stones and pounded bones can be had at all times, with 

 a dust-hole to wash lierself in, and, if she be young, she will 

 quite probably forget that it is winter, and proceed to lay. 

 Old Hens cannot be so easily deceived. They are too cunning. 

 It is as much as a bargain to get them to lay by the first of 

 April. These stubborn old matriarchs should be served like 

 traitors to liberty have their tails cut off, just behind their 

 ears; for, according to Napoleon, they have passed the grand 

 climacteric of a female's usefulness. You remember what he 

 told Madam De Stael. "But my pen wanders." Let us get 

 back to Chicken-feed. 



Pounded oyster-shells and slacked lime are considered 



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