108 HATCHED BY HENS ANCIENT ERROR. 



pends on the weather and the strength of the duck- 

 lings. A fortnight seems the longest time neces- 

 sary ; and they may sometimes be permitted to en- 

 joy the pond at the end of a week, but not for too 

 great a length at once, least of all in cold wet wea- 

 ther, which will affect and cause them to scour and 

 appear rough and draggled. In such case, they must 

 be kept within a while, and have an allowance of 

 bean or pea-meal mixed with their ordinary food. 

 The meal of buck-wheat and the former is then pro- 

 per. The straw beneath the duck should be often 

 renewed, that the brood may have a dry and com- 

 fortable bed; and the mother herself be well fed 

 with solid corn, without an ample allowance of which 

 ducks are not to be reared or kept in perfection, 

 although they gather so much abroad. 



DUCK EGGS are often hatched by HENS, when 

 ducks are more in request than chickens ; also as 

 ducks, in unfavourable situations, are the more easy 

 to rear, as more hardy ; and the plan has no objec- 

 tion in a confined place, and with a small stock, 

 without the advantage of a pond; but the hen is 

 much distressed, as is sufficiently visible, and, in 

 fact, injured, by the anxiety she suffers in witnessing 

 the supposed perils of her children, venturing upon 

 the water. 



The old wife's plan of suffering a hen to hatch a 

 chicken or two with the ducklings, is unwise. The 

 hen, for the sake of even a single individual of her 

 more natural progeny, will entirely neglect her foster 

 children the ducklings, at the critical time when 

 they most need her guidance and protection. Their 



