252 FOWLS. Chap. VII. 



two or three years old, not uncommonly become ruddy ; these 

 latter Bantams occasionally " even moult brassy-winged, or 

 actuallj^ red-shouldered." So that in these several cases we 

 see a plain tendency to reversion to the hues of G. hanltiva, 

 even during the lifetime of the individual bird. With 

 Spanish, Polish, pencilled Hamburgh, silver-spangled Ham- 

 burgh fowls, and with some other less common breeds, I have 

 never heard of a black-breasted red bird having appeared. 



From my experience with pigeons, I made the following 

 crosses. I first killed all my own poultry, no others living 

 near my house, and then procured, by Mr. Tegetmeier's 

 assistance, a first-rate black Spanish cock, and hens of the 

 following pure breeds, — white Game, white Cochin, silver- 

 spangled Polish, silver-spangled Hamburgh, silver-pencilled 

 Hamburgh, and white Silk. In none of these breeds is there 

 a trace of red, nor when kept pure have I ever heard of the 

 appearance of a red feather ; though such an occurrence 

 would perhaps not be very improbable with white Games 

 and white Cochins. Of the many chickens reared from the 

 above six crosses the majority were black, both in the down 

 and in the first plumage ; some were white, and a very few 

 were mottled black and white. In one lot of eleven mixed 

 eggs from the white Game and white Cochin by the Hilack 

 Spanish cock, seven of the chickens were white, and only 

 four black. I mention this fact to show that whiteness of 

 plumage is strongly inherited, and that the belief in the 

 prepotent power in the male to transmit his colour is not 

 always correct. The chickens were hatched in the spring, 

 and in the latter part of August several of the young cocks 

 began to exhibit a change, which with some of them increased 

 during the following years. Thus a young male bird from 

 the silver- spangled Polish hen was in its first plumage coal- 

 black, and combined in its comb, crest, wattle, and beard, the 

 characters of both parents ; but when two years old the 

 secondary wing-feathers became largely and symmetrically 

 marked with white, and, wherever in G. bankiva the hackles 

 are red, they were in this bird greenish-black along the shaft, 

 narrowly bordered with brownish-black, and this again 

 broadly bordered with very pale yellowish-brown ; so that in 



