G8 POULTRY. 



nal maternity are not uncommon in the gallinaceous race. In the 

 July number of the " Cottage Gardener," (1854) an excellent 

 work, published in London, mention is made of a brooding Shanghae 

 Cockjwho took charge of a brood of chicks,whose mother left them at a 

 fortnight old. In the August number of the same work, two young 

 Cockerels are noticed which were brooding Dorking, Chittiprat,Span- 

 ish and Cochin chickens, from three weeks to two months old. And 

 in the September number, a correspondent speaks of a White 

 Shanghae Cock, to whose care some chicks were delivered as an 

 experiment, and who clucked and called and scratched /or and fed 

 them, with the greatest care, carrying them on his back and com- 

 forting them in every possible way, by day, and at night brooding 

 them under his wings. The reverse of this, in the crowing of hens, 

 is also not uncommon. The writer remembers one among some hens 

 kept in Boston by his father. So then we have Cock-hens and Hen- 

 cocks, and nature is not always true to herself, though that is her 

 affair and not ours, and if she chooses to let the Hen occasionally 

 " wear the breeches " and crow, and 



" Mothers monsters prove ;" 



and if she permit the Cock to become tender-hearted and warm- 

 breasted and philoprogenitive, and a nursing father, gentle as a 

 " sucking dove," the Committee have nothing to say against it. To 

 proceed, therefore, they award 



To George Perley, of Georgetown, two dollars, for his fourteen 

 White Fantail Pigeons, all from one pair the present year, and for 

 his Kuffs and Tumblers. 



To A. P. Bateman, of Georgetown, one dollar and fifty cents, 

 for his Fantails, Carriers, Ruffs and Tumblers. 



To M. C. Andrews, of Lawrence, seventy-five cents, for his Fan- 

 tails, Ruffs and Tumblers. 



These were all very beautiful specimens, and such as could not be 

 surpassed by any fancy breeders. We say nothing of the practical 

 good to be derived from an extensive cultivation of fancy birds of 

 any sort, yet as a pleasant accompaniment about the house and 

 barn, equally interesting to the " old folks at home " and to the 

 " bonnie bairns " about the homestead, nothing surpasses the race 

 of the Columbidoe, and they have been kept and cosseted in all 

 time, and consecrated as emblems of innocence, harmlessness and 

 peace, disposed to " rough and tumble " only in their name. 



