46 THE PRACTICAL POULTRY KEEPER. 



they be actually upon the ground. It is only necessary the 

 hen should be protected from wind and rain, in order to 

 avoid rheumatism ; and this is most effectually done by 

 employing for the nest a tight wooden box, like Fig. 12, 

 open at the bottom, and also in front, with the exception of 

 a strip three inches high to contain the 

 straw. Let one of these be so placed 

 in the back corner of a shed, touching 

 the side, the front being turned to the 

 back wall, and about nine inches from 

 it, and the hen will be in the strictest 

 privacy, will be perfectly sheltered, and 

 kept cool, and never mistake her own 

 12 . nest for the one which may be placed 



in the other corner. 

 At ordinary seasons a damp situation is best for the 

 sitting shed, and will ensure good hatching in hot weather, 

 when perhaps all the neighbours are complaining that their 

 chicks are dead in the shells. Attempting to keep the nest 

 and eggs dry has ruined many a brood. It is not so in 

 nature ; every morning the hen leaves her nest, and has to 

 seek her precarious meal through the wet grass, which 

 drenches her as if she had been ducked in a pond. With this 

 damp breast she returns, and the eggs are duly moistened. 

 But if the nest be dry, the hen be kept dry, and the 

 weather happen to be hot and dry also, the moisture within 

 the egg itself becomes dried to the consistency of glue, and 

 the chick, being unable to move round within the shell, 

 cannot fracture it, and perishes. Such a mishap will not 

 happen if the ground under the nest be damp and cool. 

 All that is necessary in such a case is to scrape a slight 

 hollow in the bare earth, place the nest-box, already de- 

 scribed, over it, and put in a moderate quantity of straw, 

 well broken. Care must be taken to well fill up the corners 



