17G COCK, HEN, AND CHICKENS. 



fections. No longer voracious or cowardly, see abstains 

 from all food that her young can swallow, and flies boldly 

 at every creature that she thinks is likely to do them 

 mischief. Whatever the invading animal be, she boldly at- 

 tacks him; the horse, the hog, or the mastiff. When 

 marching at the head of her little troop, she acts the com- 

 mander, and has a variety of notes to call her numerous 

 train to their food, or to warn them of approaching danger. 

 Upon one of these occasions, I have seen the whole brood 

 run for security into the thickest part of. a hedge, when the 

 hen herself ventured boldly forth, and faced a fox that 

 came for plunder. With a good mastiff, however, we 

 soon sent the invader back to his retreat ; but not before he 

 had wounded the hen in several places. 



Ten or twelve chickens are the greatest number that a 

 good hen can rear and clutch at a time ; but as this bears 

 no proportion to the number of her eggs, schemes have 

 been immagined to clutch all the eggs of a hen, and thus 

 turn her produce to the greatest advantage. !By these 

 contrivances it has been obtained that a hen, that ordina- 

 rily produces but twelve chickens in the year, is found to 

 produce as many chickens as eggs, and consequently often 

 above two hundred. The contrivance I mean is the arti- 

 ficial method of hatching chickens in stoves, as is practised 

 at Grand Cairo and also in this country ; or in a chemical 

 laboratory property graduated, as has been effected by 

 Mr. Reaumur. At Grand Cairo, they thus produce six or 

 seven thousand chickens at a time ; where, as they are 

 brought forth in their mild spring, which is warmer than 

 our summer, the young ones thrive without clutching. But 

 it is otherwise in our colder and unequal climate ; the 

 little animal may, without much difficulty, be hatched 

 from the shell ; but they almost all perish when excluded. 

 To remedy this, Reaumur has made use of a woollen hen, 

 as he calls it; which was nothing more than putting the 

 young ones in a warm basket, and clapping over them a 



