Ill] OF POULTRY 297 



sitting hens should be confined so that they may 

 go on sitting night and day, with an interval in the 

 early morning and evening for food and drink to 

 be given them. The keeper ought to go round 

 every few days and turn the QggSy so that all parts 

 of them may be kept equally warm. They say you 

 can tell if an Qgg is good and full or not by putting 

 it into water, for an empty one floats and a full one 

 sinks, but that shaking them in order to find this 

 out is a mistake, as it destroys the germinal veins. ^ 

 The same people tell you that the Qgg which, when 

 held up to the light, appears transparent, is good 

 12 for nothing. Those who want to keep eggs for 

 future use rub them well with fine salt or brine for 

 three or four hours. This is then washed off, and 

 the eggs are covered over with bran or chaff. Care 

 is taken that the number of eggs in a sitting is un- 

 even. Four days after a hen begins to sit it becomes 

 possible for the keeper to learn if the eggs being 

 hatched contain an embryo. If he holds one to the 



weather (x, 54), *• for eggs are hatched more quickly in warm 

 weather. Thus in summer eighteen days only are needed, in 

 winter twenty-five." 



' Vitales venas. Pliny, who gives all three tests {he. cit.)y 

 uses this expression (cf. x, 54): Concuti vero experiviento 

 velatU^ quoniam non gignant confusis vitalibus vents. These 

 venae vitales formed what Pliny, following Aristotle (vi, 3, 

 ii. A.), calls parva velut sanj^uinea guiia, quod esse cor avium 

 existimant, primum in omni corpore id gigni opinantes: in ovo 

 eerie gutta salil palpitatque (x, 53). 



The Geoponica (xiv, 7) call these venae vitales. to ^wnicuv, 

 also iviCki Ti Koi v^aiftoy. 



