114 BREEDING AND EXHIBITION OF PRIZE POULTRY. 



never before known, the breed has become one of the most 

 delicate of all, and the laying qualities of at least some strainb 

 have greatly fallen off. 



It would be difficult to avoid such evil results if it were not 

 for a valuable compensating principle, which admits of crossing. 

 That principle is, that any desired point possessed in perfection 

 by a foreign breed may be introduced by crossing into a strain 

 it is desired to improve, and every other characteristic of the 

 cross be, by selection, afterwards bred out again. Or one or 

 more of these additional characteristics may be also retained, 

 and thus a neiv variety be established, as many have been 

 within the last few years. 



A thorough understanding of both the foregoing principles 

 is so important that we shall endeavour to illustrate each by 

 examples. 



Without foundation by long-continued selection no strain 

 can be depended upon to breed similar specimens to the parents. 

 For instance the coloured Dorking is a breed which assumes 

 within certain limits almost any variety of colour, and occa- 

 sionally, amongst others, that now known as " silver-grey." 

 By breeding from these birds, and selecting from the progeny 

 only the silver-greys, that colour has been established, like any 

 other might be, as a permanent variety, which breeds true to 

 feather with very little variation. Now a pen of birds precisely 

 similar in colour and appearance might, possibly, be produced 

 from ordinary coloured Dorkings, and shown as silver-greys ; 

 and the most severe teslf might fail to discover any apparent 

 difference between them and the purest-bred pen in the same 

 show. But breeding would show the distinction instantly : 

 whilst one pen would breed true to itself, and produce silver- 

 grey chickens, the accidental pen would chiefly produce ordi- 

 nary Dorkings, with very few silver-greys amongst them ; and 

 though in time, by continuing to select these, a pure strain 

 would ultimately be established, for immediate purposes the 



