THE KED GAMES. 81 



Mr. Kinney. If the gentleman near Boston, to whom I 

 referred, had taken a little of the tobacco which he had been 

 eating, and burned it in his poultry-house (first having made 

 it tight), he would have got rid of that pest. When I was a 

 boy, I used to read in the papers, "If you want to keep a hen- 

 house free from vermin, fumigate it," but I never heard what to 

 use until quite recently, when I have seen sulphur and tobacco 

 recommended. I have been in the habit, for more than 

 twenty-five years, of burning a few tobacco stems and leaves, 

 once or twice a week in summer, and once in two or three 

 weeks in winter, in my hen-houses. Tobacco smoke does 

 not hurt hens any more than people. I think that, like men, 

 they may learn to like it ; I think my old hens have. But lice 

 do not like it, and you will find that tobacco will kill the little 

 pests that kill your hens at night, on their roosts, and on the 

 setting nests, when you think they die by some disease. 



Mr. Bill of Paxtou. I have had some experience in keep- 

 ing hens, but I rise chiefly to add a word to what was said 

 on one point by the gentleman who gave us the very 

 instructive and interesting essay, and that point is this. He 

 spoke of hen-houses in the sides of hills, near our farm build- 

 ings, so that the fowls might forage in the pasture with the 

 cattle. Now, he did not state what breed of hen would be 

 the best for that purpose, but I judge from my own experience 

 that a kind of hen not much in favor, perhaps, with most hen 

 fanciers, — I mean the Red Game, — is the one best adapted 

 to that purpose. 



There is an impression abroad among hen dealers, and those 

 who have not inquired into the matter, that the Red Game, or 

 Game hens, are of little value except for their fighting 

 qualities ; but with all my keeping of the Red Game, I never 

 have seen one fight but once, and that was with a White Leg- 

 horn, and he got awfully thrashed; so I am not keeping him 

 for that purpose. But I find that in the pastures, the Red 

 Game have the foraging quality, and that is the point I rose to 

 make. I know tolerably well four or five kinds of Red 

 Game birds, and any one of them will walk off and feed by 

 themselves several hundred rods, — almost a quarter of a mile. 



Another notion that is prevalent about them is, that they are 

 quite wild. That comes partly from the name — Red Game. 

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