58 ARTIFICIAL HATCHING USELESS. 



might be conducted here with sufficient success, and 

 to the immense multiplication of domestic fowls of 

 every description, an adequate expenditure in houses 

 and attendants being pre-supposed. On a first con- 

 sideration of the subject, indeed, a great apparent 

 difficulty may present, of obtaining a sufficient quan- 

 tity of eggs ; but the case is parallel, at any rate, to 

 a certain degree, in Egypt, where, notwithstanding, 

 such an obstacle has never impeded the practice. This 

 view is, in all likelihood, appropriate to France 

 equally with England. No person, then, will attempt 

 artificial hatching, but from the motive of mere curi- 

 osity, and that motive must indeed be powerful, to 

 carry one through the endless labour and attendance 

 required. A lady, some years since, obtained a pre- 

 mium of ten guineas from one of the Societies, for 

 the plan of multiplying chickens, by causing the hens 

 to sit CONSTANTLY or a great many times in the season, 

 which we had tried without success many years before. 

 It is, in fact, to undertake the most difficult part of 

 the artificial process, that of bringing up the chickens 

 without hens. Nor would the disappointments be 

 few in procuring hens which would sit beyond the 

 usual periods, and those so disposed soon become 

 consumptive and useless from such hard duty. The 

 plan, indeed, as a general one, is totally useless. On 

 this head, De Reaumur thus characte rizes the hens 

 of his country : 



"So long as we shall depend entirely upon our hens, 

 we must not expect to see the multiplication of the 

 species carried so far as might be wished ; it is not 

 nearly all the hens of a poultry-yard, that are willing 



