OUR DOMESTIC BIRDS 



How fowls were kept in old times. Less than a century ago 

 it was quite a common practice among the cottagers of England 

 and Scotland to keep their fowls in their cottages at night. 

 Sometimes a loft, to which the birds had access by a ladder 



outside, was fitted up 

 for them. Sometimes 

 perches for the fowls 

 were put in the living 

 room of the cottage. 

 Such practices seem to 

 us wrong from a sanitary 

 standpoint, but it is only 

 within very recent times 

 that people have given 

 careful attention to sani- 

 tation, and in old times, 

 when petty thieving was 

 more common than it is 

 now, there was a de- 

 cided advantage in hav- 

 ing such small domestic 

 animals as poultry and 

 pigs where they could 

 not be disturbed with- 

 out the owner's knowing 

 it. The practice of keep- 

 ing fowls in the owner's 

 dwelling seems to have 

 been confined to the 



poorer people, who had no large domestic animals for which 

 they must provide suitable outbuildings. On large farms special 

 houses were sometimes provided for poultry, but they were 

 probably oftener housed with other animals, for few people 

 thought it worth while to give them special attention. 



FIG. 20. White-Faced Black Spanish cockerel 



(Photograph from R. A. Rowan, Los Angeles, 



California) 



