24 PRACTICAL PHEASANT REARING. 



substitution ; put the eggs as you unpack them into a 

 basket lined with flannel, and then place them under 

 the hens, fifteen eggs to a hen up till May, when you 

 may venture to entrust her with seventeen. In the 

 early cold spring a hen cannot do as much justice to 

 as many eggs as she can later on. Clap down the 

 lids, and keep her tight to her work for the first four 

 or five days. During this period, while the yolk is 

 running, " ten minutes for refreshment," the same 

 measure that is generally meted out to the exhausted 

 railway traveller, is all that should be doled out per 

 diem to your trusty agent. Any little chill tells very 

 severely upon the eggs at this period of the incubation, 

 and is another frequent cause of the return of an 

 undeserved verdict of unfertility against the vendor of 

 the ovarian specimens. After this first important 

 period of " extra duty," a " furlough " of from twenty 

 to thirty minutes may profitably be accorded every 

 morning to your faithful hens ; a rest now does them 

 good, and after the eggs have once " set," as it is 

 termed, it is very hard to spoil them, for they will 

 stand almost anything ; but remember at first to keep 

 the old hens well to their work. Shortly after being 

 replaced in their boxes, their keeper should go round 

 and examine each hen to see that no egg is lying 

 outside her wings. Careless hens, that contract this 

 objectionable habit, will have one or even more of 

 their eggs out in the cold, and consequently, unless 

 discovered in time, in a fair way to be spoilt. The 



