62 



HISTORY OF BIRDS. 



are as black as ebony. Whether this tincture 

 proceeds from their food, as the bones are 

 tinctured red by feeding upon madder, I leave 

 to the discussion of others : satisfied with the 

 fact, let us decline speculation. 



In their first propagation in Europe, there 

 were distinctions then that now subsist no 

 longer. The ancients esteemed those fowls 

 xvhose plumage was reddish as invaluable ; 

 but as for the white, it was considered as ut- 

 terly unfit for domestic purposes. These they 

 regarded as subject to become a prey to rapa- 

 cious birds; and Aristotle thinks them less 

 fruitful than the former. Indeed his division 

 of those birds seems to be taken from their cu- 

 linary uses ; the one sort he calls generous and 

 noble, being remarkable for fecundity: the 

 other sort, ignoble and useless, from their ste- 

 rility. These distinctions differ widely from 

 our modern notions of generosity in this ani- 

 mal ; that which we call the game-cock being 

 by no means so fruitful as the ungenerous 

 dung-hill cock, which we treat with contempt 

 The Athenians had their cock matches as well 

 as we; but it is probable that they did not 

 enter into that refinement of choosing out the 

 most barren of the species for the purposes of 

 combat. 



However this be, no animal in the world 

 has greater courage than the cock, when op- 

 posed to one of his own species ; and in every 

 part of the world, where refinement and po- 

 lished manners have not entirely taken place, 

 cock-fighting is a principal diversion. In 

 China, India, the Philippine islands, and all 

 over the East, cock-fighting is the sport and 

 amusement even of kings and princes. With 

 us it is declining every day, and it is to be 

 hoped that it will in time become only the 

 pastime of the lowest vulgar. It is the opin- 

 ion of many, that we have a bolder and more 

 valiant breed than is to be found elsewhere ; 

 and some, indeed, have entered into a serious 

 discussion upon the cause of so flattering a sin- 

 gularity. But the truth is, they have cocks 

 in China as bold, if not bolder, than ours ; and 

 what would still be considered as valuable 

 among cockers here, they have more strength 

 with less weight. Indeed, I have often won- 

 dered why men who lay two or three hundred 

 pounds upon the prowess of a single cock, 

 have not taken every method to improve the 

 breed. Nothing, it is probable, could do this 

 more effectually than by crossing the strain, 

 as it is called, by a foreign mixture ; and whe- 

 ther having recourse even to the wild cock in 

 the forests of India would not be useful, I 

 leave to their consideration. However, it is 

 a mean and ungenerous amusement, nor would 

 I wish much to promote it. The truth is, I 

 could give such instructions with regard to 

 cook-fighting;, and could so arm one of these 



c; ra* 



animals against the other that it would be al- 

 most impossible for the adversary's cock to 

 survive the first or second blow ; but as Boer- 

 haave has said upon a former occasion, when 

 he was treating upon poisons, " to teach the 

 arts of cruelty is equivalent to committing 

 them." 



This extraordinary courage in the cock is 

 thought to proceed from his being the most sa- 

 lacious of all other birds whatsoever. A sin- 

 gle cock suffices for ten or a dozen hens; and 

 it is said of him, that he is the only animal 

 whose spirits are not abated by indulgence 

 But then he soon grows old ; the radical mois 

 ture is exhausted ; and in three or four years 

 he becomes utterly unfit for the purposes of 

 impregnation. " Hens also," to use the words 

 of Willoughby, " as they for the greatest part 

 of the year daily lay eggs, cannot suffice foi 

 so many births, but for the most part, after 

 three years, become effete and barren : for 

 when they have exhausted all their seed-eggs, 

 of which they had but a certain quantity from 

 the beginning, they must necessarily cease to 

 lay, there being no new ones generated with- 

 in. 



The hen seldom clutches a brood of chickens 

 above once a season, though instances have 

 been known in which they produced two. 

 The number of eggs a domestic hen will lay 

 in the year are above two hundred, provided 

 she be well fed, and supplied with water and 

 liberty. It matters not much whether she be 

 trodden by the cock or no ; she will continue 

 to lay, although all the eggs of this kind can 

 never, by hatching, be brought to produce a 

 living animal. Her nest is made without any 

 care, if left to herself; a hole scratched into 

 the ground, among a few bushes, is the only 

 preparation she makes for this season of pa- 

 tient expectation. Nature, almost exhausted 

 by. its own fecundity, seems to inform her oi 

 the proper time for hatching, which she her- 

 self testifies by a clucking note, and by dis- 

 continuing to lay. The good housewives, 

 who often get more by their hens laying than 

 by their chickens, artificially protract this 

 clucking season, and sometimes entirely re- 

 move it. As soon as their hen begins to 

 cluck, they stint her in her provisions ; and if 

 that fails, they plunge her into cold water : 

 this, for the time, effectually puts back her 

 hatching ; but then it often kills the poor birds, 

 who takes cold, and dies under the opera- 

 tion. 1 



1 In the hatching of poultry, as in most other things, 

 Nature is the best guide. The hen and duck, if left to 

 themselves, find some dry, warm, sandy hedge or bank, 

 in which to deposit their eggs, forming their nests of 

 leaves, moss or dry grass. In this way the warmth is 

 retained when the bird quits the nest for the moments 

 she devotes to her scanty and hurried meal. The good 



