120 THE POULTRY-BOOK. 



is sitting, and after she has hatched ; for though she does not 

 give milk, she gives heat, and let it be observed, that as no 

 man ever yet saw healthy pigs with a poor sow, so no man 

 ever saw healthy chickens with a poor hen. This is a matter 

 much too little thought of in the rearing of poultry ; but it is a 

 matter of the greatest consequence. Never let a poor hen sit ; 

 feed the hen while she is sitting, and feed her most abundantly 

 when she has young ones ; for then her labor is very great. 

 She is making exertions of some sort or other during the whole 

 twenty-four hours ; she has no rest ; is constantly doing some- 

 thing, in order to provide food or safety for her young ones. 

 As to fatting turkeys, the best way is never to let them be poor. 

 Cramming is a nasty thing, and quite unnecessary. Barley- 

 meal mixed with skim-milk, given to them fresh and fresh, 

 will make them fat in a short time, either in a coop, in a house, 

 or running about. Boiled carrots and Swedish turnips will help, 

 and it is a change of sweet food. In France they sometimes 

 pick turkeys alive, to make them tender ; of which I shall only 

 say, that the man that can do this, or order it to be done, ought 

 to be skinned alive himself.' 



" As I observed already, once the turkey chicks shoot the red, 

 (which takes place at or about eight weeks old,) they may be 

 considered out of danger; hence, many persons conceive it 

 more profitable to buy lean, young poults, after they have got 

 the red, and then fatten them for market, to breeding them. 

 If the mortality among the chicks were greater, and were not 

 so easily to be avoided by a very little care, this might be the 

 preferable mode of going about the matter ; but as it is, there 

 can be no doubt of the greater advantage to be derived from 

 rearing our own chicks. 



In feeding the poults, after the second month, it will suffice 

 to give them such boiled common plants and herbs as are of a 

 nutritive character nettles, wild succory, milfoil, turnip-tops, 



