I'LVMOl'TII ROCK STANDARD AXD BREED HOOK 87 



Bishop, was made to Mark Pitman and V. C. Oilman, covers 

 this point with an out and out plain statement of fact : 



"Being out of health, I engaged in the business of picking 

 up fowls about the country for market purposes. Coming across 

 a lot of hawk-colored pullets, I was so pleased with them that 

 instead of butchering, I bred them to an available Asiatic grade." 



Other authorities mention White Cochins and Light Brahmas 

 as the probable source of Asiatic blood in the Drake strain be- 

 cause of their presence on the premises. Mr. Felch names Dark 

 Brahma. Whether Mr. Felch saw the evidence or drew con- 

 clusion after observing the result of Drake's crosses, we do not 

 know. It would not be strange, of course, if the "available 

 Asiatic grade" of Mr. Drake's was the "Dark Brahma" of Mr. 

 Felch's as a grade with Asiatic blood might easily resemble 

 the Dark Brahma. 



We see in the above no sign of a "Java," and this case is like 

 all others, so far as we are supplied with accounts. Those who 

 attempted to copy the fowls that Uphatn introduced and found 

 popular and profitable to breed, invariably, as far as we are 

 acquainted with the facts, used Asiatic of one kind and another, 

 but no Java blood, with Dominique. These results were, many 

 of them at least, successful. That is, these crosses produced a 

 fowl that so closely resembled the color and type of the ones 

 that Spaulding, Ramsdell and Upham were producing, that they 

 competed with them for public favor. This fact, in itself, is 

 the strongest corroboratory evidence in favor of the claim of 

 Cochin parentage. 



Bishop's Opinion and the Reasons for It. Furthermore, the 

 Rev. Mr. Bishop, who evidently gave this question much study 

 and who was editor of that Journal at the time Ramsdell's article 

 was published in the New York Poultry, Pigeon and Pet Stock 

 Bulletin, later in an article published in Farm Poultry, year 1901, 

 repudiated the Java claim, writing that upon his return (from 

 New York) to his old habitations, he became convinced that such 

 claim was not justified by facts. In his pamphlet, "Development 

 of the Plymouth Rock," Bishop makes the following pertinent 

 remarks : 



"The Drake Strain, i. e., the 'Norfolk,' never had any mixture 

 of Java blood ;" which statement agrees with the foregoing. 



Again, we find this statement : "Those who obtained their 

 birds from the Spaulding stock direct, never had any Java blood. 



