148 FARMING FOR LADIES. [chap. vi. 



South of France, where much of it is grown, 

 it is very generally used for the feeding of 

 poultry, and finer fowls can nowhere he seen. 

 Their flavour, which is superior, may be not 

 unjustly ascribed to some peculiar quality in 

 the corn — which is the favourite food of phea- 

 sants — ^but their weight and the mellowness of 

 their flesh can only be attributed to the larger 

 quantity of nutriment contained in the same 

 measure of grain ; and if buckwheat, as we 

 have shown, is in a very large proportion 

 greater in oats and barley, it must un- 

 questionably be the better kind of corn both 

 for fattening and in point of economy. In- 

 deed a very intelligent French lady, who has 

 within these few years published a sensible 

 treatise on rural economy, decidedly prefers 

 buckwheat to barley, both for the fattening of 

 poultry and for inducing the hens to lay eggs 

 early in the spring, so as to produce two 

 broods in the season. 



Although irrelevant to the subject in ques- 

 tion, we must take the liberty of acquainting 

 those ladies who may employ buckwheat for 

 this purpose, that if they order some of it to 

 be occasionally made into cakes, in the Ame- 



