GAME FOTVL.J 



POULTET. 



[game fowl. 



THE GAME FOWL. 



The Game Fowl is, iu the estimation of many, 

 one of the most beautiful of birds. His flesh is 

 excellent ; whilst the hen is a fair producer of 

 eggs, a good sitter, and attentive mother. 

 Both male and female, however, are very 

 troublesome, from the extraordinary combative 

 qualities with which they are endowed. The 

 cock has long been known for his fighting pro- 

 pensities ; and mankind having early discovered 

 this, made them administer pleasure to their 

 own destructive tendencies. " Cock-fighting 

 is indeed so old," says an article in the Sport- 

 ing Dictionary , " that we hardly know whence 

 to derive its origin. Asia, however, has the 

 credit of first fostering it ; and it seems to 

 have been cultivated by the natives amongst 

 their earliest games. The first records of 

 China note it. In Persia, it was early encou- 

 raged, in conjunction with hawking and quaii- 

 fighting ; nor was it to be wondered at, that, as 

 man became belligerent, he would, in order to 

 extend his conquests, commence his education 

 by observing the ofiensive and defensive opera- 

 tions of animals, thereby the better to regu- 

 late his own. When Themistocles was engaged 

 iu warfare with the Persians, he was struck 

 ■with admiration at the bravery and determina- 

 tion displayed in the battles between the cocks 

 of that people ; which was such as to occasion 

 him to exclaim to his admiring army, * Behold ! 

 these do not fight for their household gods, 

 for the monuments of their ancestors, nor for 

 glory, nor for liberty, nor for the safety of their 

 children, but only the one will not give way 

 tinto the other.' This so encouraged the 

 Grecians, that they fought gallantly, and ob- 

 tained the victory over the Persians ; upon 

 which, cock-fighting was, by a particular law, 

 ordained to be annually practised by the 

 Athenians. The inhabitants of Delos were 

 great lovers of the sport ; and Lanagra, a city 

 of Boeotia, the Isle of Rhodes, Chalcis and 

 Euboea, and the country of Media, were famous 

 for their generous and magnanimous race of 

 chickens. It also appears that they had 

 some peculiar method of prepariug the birds 

 for battle. Cock-fightiug was an institution, 

 partly political, at Athens, and was continued 

 there for the purpose of cultivating the seeds 

 of valour in the minds of youth. But it was 

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afterwards perverted and abused, both there 

 and iu other parts of Greece, till it became a 

 common pastime and amusement, without any 

 moral, political, or religious intention, as it was, 

 until lately, followed amongst us." 



In his form and aspect, and in the extra- 

 ordinary courage which characterises his nat- 

 ui-al disposition, the game fowl exhibits all 

 that either the naturalist or the sportsman re- 

 cognises as the heau-ideal ofliigh Mood. 



He is somewhat inferior in size to other 

 breeds ; but his shape, approximates more 

 closely to the elegance and lightness usually 

 characteristic of a pure and uncontaminated 

 race. Amongst poultry, he is what the 

 Arabian is amongst horses, the high-bred 

 short-horn amongst cattle, and the fleet grey- 

 hound amongst the canine race. Such being 

 the character of this variety of fowl, it would 

 doubtless be much more extensively cultivated 

 than it is, were it not for the difficulty attend- 

 ing the rearing of the young ; their pugnacity 

 being such, that a brood is scarcely feathered 

 before at least one-half is either killed or 

 blinded by fighting. Their elegance of form, 

 and brilliancy of colour, however, render the 

 breed objects of great admiration. They are of 

 all colours ; and each variety seems to have had 

 its patrons, the rule being to mate the cock 

 with hens of the same feather, or " rightly 

 plumed to the cock," as Spetchly has it. Devia- 

 tions from this rule are frequent, as we find the 

 same to be the case in all kinds of animals which 

 have been reduced to a state of domestication. 



When a cock is selected, he should be 

 placed with from four to six hens, bringing 

 them together in IS^ovember or December. If 

 he be young, the hens may be full-grown ; if 

 two years' old, then the hens may be young 

 pullets, in the case of a strong breed being 

 desired. Mark attentively how he bears him- 

 self to all his hens, as it frequently happens 

 that one or other of them falls under his dis- 

 pleasure, in which case she should be removed. 

 Choose the best-shaped eggs, and neither the 

 earliest nor the last laid ; and, to avoid mis- 

 takes, mark them, and place them under an 

 old game hen — the old being excellent mothers. 

 Their place for sitting should be private, and 

 free from all annoyance or intrusion. 



When hatched, the young should be regu- 

 larly audi often fed, in small quantities at a 



