TM VISION VI r. 



POULTRY. 



CIIArTEIl I. 



OniGIN OF TIIK rOMKSTIC FOWL. 



Feom the earliest records of time, tlie cock 

 seems to have been known to man, and to liavc 

 held an important place in his estimation, not 

 only on account of his qualities as a table fowl, 

 but on account of the heroic courage with which, 

 as a game bird, he is animated in combating 

 for viotorv over an antagonist. Ilis origin, 

 however, is involved in obscurity. We have 

 no means of deciding where was situated the 

 Eden in which the Adam and Eve of our do- 

 mestic fowls were first placed. All, we believe, 

 are agreed that it was in the East; but it is 

 very singular tliat they arc no longer found in 

 a wild state, any more than the camel is ; that 

 their originals are a matter of theory and spec- 

 ulation rather than of certainty ; and that, if 

 we assign them to India, we can do so only by 

 a process of reasoning based upon probability, 

 rather than fact. Presuming, however, that 

 India was the country of their origin, we find 

 it stated, on the highest authority, that the 

 range of the wild common fowl does not 

 extend, westward, beyond the lofty ranges of 

 mountains tliat form the natural boundary of 

 India in that direction; and yet the domestic 

 bird is said, by the same authority, to liave 

 been common among the western nations from 

 the remotest antiquity. As difterent views of 

 this subject have been taken by difierent writers, 

 we will bring the theories of each before the 

 reader in a form as condensed as we possibly can. 

 One supposes that the early patriarchs, before 

 leaving the eastern cradle of mankind, were 

 fortunate enough to possess themselves of an 

 individual wild species of cock and hen ; which, 

 by some means, they managed to tame, and 

 attach to either themselves or the locality in 

 which they settled. By constant care these 

 became domesticated ; and their ofl'spring, in- 

 heriting the attachments of their parent:), be- 



came still more civilised, and consequently 

 less inclined to wander from the j)lace of tlieir 

 birth. To what species, however, did this first 

 pair belong? Mr. Edward Blyth, Curator to 

 the Asiatic Society's IMuseum at Calcutta, and 

 one of the ablest ornithologists of the day, 

 adheres to the opinion that all the domestic 

 varieties of fowl are derived from one wild 

 species of jungle fowl — namely, from that 

 common in the Bengal Presidency, and the 

 countries to the east and south-ea^t of it, and 

 not at all from Gallus Sonncratii, as has been 

 so often suggested. " In the formerly Burmese 

 province of Arekan," says Mr. Richardson, 

 following Mr. Blyth's argument, " many of the 

 tame hens are scarcely distinguishable from 

 the wild, and only so by being a little coarser 

 in the leg, with a tendency generally to a 

 greater development of comb ; and these hens, 

 hardly removed from the wild, are fi'ce breeders. 

 Domestic cocks, of various breeds, may often 

 be found to match, feather by feather, with the 

 wild bird, even some of tolerably gigantic di- 

 mensions; and the voice is absolutely that of 

 an English game fowl. This is of importance, 

 as the notes of the two other Indian species 

 are so utterly difierent ; the dill'erence of voice 

 among the races of domestic fowls being as 

 nothing in comparison. Moreover, the wild 

 hen signifies aloud, after the same fashion as 

 the tame one, her deposition of an egg ; and 

 thus it is that the eggs are occasionally found, 

 though not very commonly." 



]\[r. Blyth remarks, in reference to the re- 

 searches of M. Suudevall — "He might well have 

 sought in vain for traces of the wild Gallus 

 Sun/icraiii in the domestic poultry of India, 

 inasmuch as though, curiously enough, I have 

 found that species of South India far moreeasiltf 

 domesticable than the Bengal jungle fowl — the 



