SHACKBAGS. 



Indian cock is described as a bird of most beautiful 

 plumage, consisting of the following five colours 

 black, white, green, red, and blue. The back part of 

 the head has a sort of fleshy substance, of pyramidal 

 figure, scaly, and of a blood-red colour : the bill thick 

 and strong, and the breast mottled beautifully with 

 red and green. The tail consists of twelve large 

 flaming feathers, resembling those of a peacock. The 

 comb upon the head is double, with a single wattle 

 hanging beneath the lower mandible, an inch and a 

 half long ; the beak and legs yellow. It is a wild 

 fowl, but easily domesticated. Nothing is said of the 

 quality of its flesh. 



Shackbags. 



Formerly the largest variety, but in all probability 

 it has been entirely worn out for some years. It 

 was called the Duke of Leeds' breed, his Grace, 

 more than fifty years since, being a great amateur 

 breeder of them ; but it does not appear whether 

 his Grace first raised the variety, or whether it 

 arose merely from improving the size of the common 

 dung-hill kind, or from any foreign cross ; but the 

 former is the most probable conjecture, on account 

 of the whiteness and fineness of the flesh, in the 

 genuine shackbag. The only one I ever possessed 

 was a red one, in 1784, weighing about ten pounds, 

 which was provided for me at the price of one guinea, 

 by Goff, the dealer, who then lived upon Holborn 

 Hill, in London, and who, at the end of two years, 

 received him back at half a guinea, having allowed me 

 in the interim three shillings and sixpence each, for 



