164 LIFE OF TEGETMEIER 



characteristic of the man that he should write 

 as plainly of that which he disapproved as of 

 that he approved. My then head-keeper, like 

 the rest of the fraternity, had ideas of his own 

 on the subject of rearing young pheasants, and 

 he confided to my old friend as a valuable secret 

 his practice of giving the chicks Friar's Balsam. 

 This was duly recorded in the Field, with the 

 candid assertion that the young birds would do 

 quite as well without it. His medical training 

 had given Tegetmeier knowledge of such medica- 

 ments and lent the weight of authority to his 

 opinion on such matters." 



Overstocking, whether of pheasants, poultry, 

 or partridges, was the error he sought and fought 

 whenever the question of disease among birds 

 was brought to his notice ; and as editor of 

 the Field Poultry Department, he had larger 

 opportunities of collecting evidence than any 

 other man in the Kingdom. His views on the 

 subject, arrived at after many years of experi- 

 ence, may be briefly summed up thus : Let the 

 ground carry a natural head of birds ; avoid high 

 feeding as detrimental, and so far as partridges 

 are concerned, import new blood periodically. 

 When the advantages of crossing with Hungarian 

 birds were being debated, he took occasion to 

 point out that there "is no magic in Hungarian 

 blood " ; the beneficial results observed were 

 due simply to the fact that it was fresh. 



