176 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



done, we let the matter go, thinking that the beautiful, 

 3^oung cross-bred roosters of our own raising would do 

 very well. Now we see, in the lot of mongrel-looking 

 cockerels and pullets of this year's crop, what a mistake we 

 made. Back they go two or three generations to gray 

 Dorkings and Brahmas for their legs and their plumage ; or 

 perhaps twenty generations to the Malays ; or they are ring- 

 streaked, blotched and speckled like Jacob's kine ; and 

 there are hardly half a dozen with anything like Plymouth 

 Rock or Dominique plumage. Fortunately they were not 

 essentially injured in form, though we have had an unusual 

 number of broken-legged and bent-toed chickens, or those 

 disabled by one accident or another ; and, on the whole, have 

 been pretty well punished. I believe this would nearly all have 

 been avoided if we had bred from pure-blooded cocks ; that 

 is, the general characteristics would have been maintained 

 or improved, the plumage would have been that of Plymouth 

 Rocks, with a sprinkling of black chickens, and they would 

 have had vigor and discretion enough to have kept out 

 from under the feet of horses and cows, and so Avould not 

 have been maimed and lamed. 



GRADING AND CROSSING. 



Repeated crossing with cocks of the same breed grades 

 up a flock of foAvls until they can hardly, or can not, be dis- 

 tinguished from full bloods. At the same time the excel- 

 lences attributable to the original mothers of the flock are 

 growing "small by degrees," or disappearing altogether. 

 This indicates the desirableness of taking a rather violent 

 cross just as soon as fixed .tendencies are established, and 

 the flock has a thoroughbred character. How many genera- 

 tions will fix the characteristics of the breed it is hard to 

 tell, for breeds vary in their ability to impress their own 

 traits. There must be system in this grading and crossing, 

 or we shall soon have only mongrels of less promise than 

 the old-fashioned fowls with which we are supposed to have 

 started. 



In crossing two breeds of marked dissimilar character- 

 istics, which have long been bred for different qualities, we 

 are sure to get individuals in the first generation which 



