SIGNS CAUTIONS WEAKNESS. 41 



may be useful, and when there is much resistance 

 and apparent pain to the bird, the process must be 

 conducted in the gentlest manner, and the shell se- 

 parated into a number of small pieces. The SIGNS 

 of a need of assistance are, the egg .being partly 

 pecked, and the efforts of the chicken discontinued 

 for five or six hours. In commencement, the shell 

 may be broken cautiously, by striking it with the 

 end of a key ; the rotten egg is known immediately 

 by the motion of the contained fluid, and previous 

 unsteady incubation. 



WEAKNESS from cold may disable the chicken 

 from commencing the operation of pecking the shell, 

 which must then be artificially performed, with a 

 circular fracture, such as is made by the bird itself. 

 Pullets are occasionally liable to cause this defect. 

 We have had but little success in this case, the 

 chickens after delivery seldom succeeding ; but the 

 following quotation from De Reaumur will be fully 

 explanatory. 



" This assistance, which is so important to many 

 chickens, might prove fatal to others ; for which rea- 

 son I would advise the reader not to attempt it in 

 too great a hurry. My opinion is, the facility of 

 coming out of their shells ought not to be procured 

 to any but those which have been nearly four and 

 twenty hours together without getting forward in 

 their work. There are chickens, as I have already 

 observed, which shew too great an impatience to 

 peck their shells, and do it before the yolk is en- 

 tirely got into their body : it would prove fatal to 

 those, were they enabled to come out of their shell 



