20 



nest two or three days, and then abandon it altogether. This can 

 be avoided by allowing them to sit several days, to test their con- 

 stancy ; if they prove really in heat, select fresh laid eggs of a 

 sufficient number to be tvell covered — an odd number is best be- 

 cause the eggs will pack most regularly. In selecting these eggs, 

 some persons believe that when the long, slim ones are taken, the 

 chickens will be invariably males, and the thick, nearly round ones, 

 females. This is a very uncertain plan to adopt in the choice of 

 eggs and ought never to be relied upon. The surest method seems 

 to be, to select those eggs, if pullets are wanted, which, wdien they 

 are held between the eye and a lamp, discover the cavity at the 

 great end of each egg to be at one side of the centre of it. If it 

 is at the centre, the chick will be a male. 



The sitting hen should have her nest where she caniiot be trou- 

 bled by other fowls. Give her a retired, quiet place, and she will 

 seldom want to leave her nest ; but if she is in the bustle of the 

 poultry house, she will be nervous and restless, and oftentimes will 

 abandon her nest. There should be convenient to her sitting:; 

 place a box or pile of ashes, where she can dust and wash her- 

 selt^ — plenty of food, and pure water. These are the only atten- 

 tions she requires. The period of incubation is twenty-one days; 

 during this time the hen should be left to her own inclinations, 

 and the eggs should not be touched or moved ; she carefully turns 

 them that they may receive a uniform warmth, and any interfer- 

 ence with her management only irritates her, — sometimes causing 

 her to break the eggs, or leave them entirely. At the end of the 

 twenty-first «day, all the chickens should be hatched ; some, how- 

 ever, in consequence of great thickness and toughness of the shell, 

 are unable to break it ; these may be assisted by carefully, with 

 the point of a penknife, chipping away the shell where the little 

 punctures are made by the chick. Great care, however, is ne- 

 cessary in doing this ; and, as a general thing, it should be 

 avoided. The chickens require no food for twenty-four hours af- 

 ter being hatched. They may be then fed on a dough made of 

 ludial meal and water ; this should not be too thin, as it is liable 

 in that state to induce diarrhoea. If the weather is pleasant, the 

 chickens may be put out in coops the second day ai'ter hatching. 

 These coops are most conveniently made in the following manner : 

 take pieces of boards four feet in length, and make a platform three 

 feet in width : to the two sides of this platform nail other pieces 

 of boards, which will meet together as a roof, over the middle of 

 the bottom ; at the ends nail laths, sufficiently wide apart to per- 

 mit the chickens to pass through coratortably. This gives a dry, 

 comfortable house, which with care may he made to last a number of 

 years. These coops should not be placed vei'y near each other, as 

 the chickens are apt to wander into other houses than their own, 



