ASSISTANCE IN HATCHING. 49 



seldom succeeding ; but the following quotation from 

 De Reaumur will be fully explanatory. 



" This assistance, which is so important to many 

 chickens, might prove fatal to others ; for which rea- 

 son I would advise the reader not to attempt it in 

 too great a hurry. My opinion is, the facility of 

 coming out of their shells ought not to be procured 

 to any but those which have been nearly four and 

 twenty hours together without getting forward in 

 their work. There are chickens, as I have already 

 observed, which show too great an impatience to 

 peck their shells, and do it before the yolk is en- 

 tirely got into their body : it would prove fatal to 

 those, were they enabled to come out of their shell 

 a few hours after they have pecked it, although they 

 would be never the worse for it afterwards, IF NO 

 YOLK WERE LEFT OUT OF THEIR body, at the instant 

 of their coming out of the shell. However, it is 

 generally better to let the chicken come out of the 

 shell of its own accord : for in that case, he is hatched 

 only when his limbs have become sufficiently strong, 

 and when they have assumed in the shell a consist- 

 ence and vigour, which they would not be so sure to 

 acquire, if they were exposed to the open air. 



" I have often found, both among the chickens 

 which were hatched of their own accord, and those 

 which I have assisted, some that, notwithstanding 

 the perfect consolidation of the place through which 

 the yolk had been introduced into their body, had 

 nevertheless still without it portions of intestines, 

 some longer, some shorter: one might think that 

 these portions had not been inclosed* in the capacity 



D 



