TO FATTEN. 109 



aquatic nature will be constantly urging them to the 

 water, where they will remain until exhausted, re- 

 turning to land like drowning rats, and probably 

 finding no mother to brood them. Thus great 

 numbers of ducklings are annually lost ; and half-a- 

 dozen of them may be lost for the sake of a chick 

 or two. I have heard of setting duck eggs under 

 a goose, which would cover a considerable number. 

 M. Tessiers memoir read to the Royal Academy of 

 Sciences at Paris, states the period of incubation 

 of the hen upon ducks' eggs, to be from twenty- 

 jive to thirty-four days. I have neither known nor 

 before heard of such a protracted sitting as thirty- 

 four days. 



Ducks are FATTENED, either in confinement, with 

 plenty of food and water, or full as well, restricted to 

 a pond, with access to as much solid food as they 

 will eat : which last method I prefer. They fatten 

 speedily, in this mode, mixing their hard meat with 

 such variety abroad as is natural to them, more 

 particularly if already in good case ; and there is no 

 check or impediment to thrift from pining, but every 

 mouthful tells and weighs its due weight. A dish of 

 mixed food, if preferred to whole corn, may remain 

 on the bank, or rather in a shed, for the ducks. I 

 must here mention a fact, which I have either ac- 

 tually verified, or supposed that I have verified. 

 BARLEY, in any form, should never be used to fatten 

 aquatics, ducks or geese, since it renders their flesh 

 loose, woolly, and insipid, and depriving it of that 

 high savoury flavour of brown meat, which is its va- 

 luable distinction ; in a word, rendering it chickeny, 



