178 



THE AMERICAN POULTERER'S COMPANION. 



pose the egg. How astonishing it must appear 

 to an observing mind, that in this substance 

 there should at all be the vital principle of an 

 animated being ; that all the parts of an ani- 

 mal's body should be concealed in it, and re- 

 quire nothing but heat to unfold and quicken 

 them ; that the whole formation of the chicken 

 should be so constant and regular that, exactly 

 at the same time, the same changes will take 

 place in the generality of eggs ; that the chick- 

 en, the moment it is hatched, is heavier than 

 the egg was before ! But even these are not 

 all the wonders in the formation of the bird 

 from the egg for this instance will serve to il- 

 lustrate the whole of the feathered tribe there 

 are others altogether hidden from our observa- 

 tions, and of which, from our very limited fac- 

 ulties, we must ever remain ignorant." 



AKTIFICIAL HATCHING. 



The method of artificial hatching, or the proc- 

 ess of bringing the vitalized embryo of the egg 

 through all its stages of development, until the 

 chick makes its exit from the shell, by artificial 

 heat, has long been practiced in China and 

 Egypt, but has never, we believe, until recently, 

 been attempted in this country. It is, however, 

 resorted to in some countries to a considerable 

 extent, and experiments in England, France, 

 and our own country have been successful; but 

 whether the plan will ever become general is 

 questionable. 



The first notices we have of hatching chick- 

 ens artificially, without the aid of hens, are to 



be found in Aristotle and Pliny. The latte* 

 mentions that the Roman empress, Livia, hatch- 

 ed an egg by carrying it about in her " wanne 

 bosome ;" and this probably gave origin to the 

 device of late to lay eggs in some warm place, 

 and to make a gentle fire underneath of small 

 straw or light chaff, to give a kind of moderate 

 heat ; but, even more, the eggs must be turned 

 by man or woman's hand both night and day ; 

 and so at the same time they looked for chick- 

 ens and had them. 



The art has been extensively practiced in 

 Egypt and China from an unknown period of 

 time. In the former place immense numbers 

 of eggs are hatched by heat in ovens or mam- 

 mels, and officers are appointed by government 

 to superintend the process, and receive a part 

 of the produce as pay. About the middle of 

 January the ovens are inspected and repaired ; 

 and as they are public, and as each has a cir- 

 cuit of fifteen or twenty villages, notice is given 

 to the inhabitants, so as they may come and 

 bring their eggs. As soon as a suitable quan- 

 tity of eggs is collected together, they are put 

 into the rooms that are to serve for the first 

 brood; for the whole of the ovens are never 

 employed at once on the same brood, but only 

 one half of those which the building contains. 



It is asserted by Barren that it is practiced 

 by the Chinese families who live constantly on 

 the water. They deposit the eggs in sand, at 

 the bottom of wooden boxes, placed on iron 

 plates and kept moderately heated. 



As there is no prospect of any of our coun- 



