184 



THE AMERICAN POULTERER'S COMPANION. 



washed in warm water, and the walls white- 

 washed with lime or lined with mats. 



Efficient ventilation is, above all, necessary 

 for renewing the air ; and for this purpose the 

 pipe of the stove may be led into a kind of chim- 

 ney, the lower opening of which, beginning on 

 a level with the ceiling of the room, will present 

 a good exit to the air it contains, while the fresh 

 air from without may be duly warmed on its 

 entrance, by bringing it through the reservoir 

 in the stove. 



Adjoining the place thus heated artificially, 

 a little piece of ground should be appropriated 

 for the chickens to go into occasionally, to ac- 

 custom them to the natural air, till, when about 

 six weeks old or more, they can do without ar- 

 tificial heat and shelter. 



The following artificial mother is recommend- 

 ed by Mr. Young, under which, he says, five 

 broods may be reared at the same time. This 

 mother may be framed of a board, ten inches 

 broad and fifteen inches long, resting on two 

 legs in front, two inches in height, and on two 

 props behind, two inches also in height. The 

 board must be perforated with many small gim- 

 let holes for the escape of heated air, and lined 

 with lamb's skin, dressed with the wool on, and 

 the woolly side so as to come in contact with 

 the chickens. Over three of these mothers, a 

 wicker basket is to be placed, for the protection 

 of the chickens, four feet long, two feet broad, 

 and fourteen inches high, with a lid open, a 

 wooden sliding-bottom to draw out for clean- 

 ing, and a long narrow trough along the front, 

 resting on two very low stools, for holding the 

 food. Perches are to be fixed on the basket, 

 for the more advanced to roost on. A flannel 

 curtain is to be placed in front at both ends of 

 the mothers, for the chickens to run under, from 

 which they soon learn to push outward and in- 

 ward. These mothers, with the wicker basket 

 over them, are to be placed against a hot wall 

 at the back of the kitchen fire, or any other warm 

 situation where the heat shall not exceed 80 

 of Fahrenheit. When the chickens are a week 

 old, they are to be carried with the mother to a 

 grass-plot for feeding, and kept warm by a tin 

 tube filled with hot water, which will continue 

 sufficiently warm for about three hours, when 



it is to be removed. Toward the evening, the 

 mothers are to be again placed against the hot 

 wall. 



The apparatus latterly employed for the pur- 

 pose of incubation has been described under the 

 names of Eccaleobion, Potolokian, and Hydro-In- 

 cubator. The former was an ingenious con- 

 trivance for hatching chickens by heated air. 

 According to Mr. Bucknell, the English invent- 

 or and proprietor of this machine, which attract- 

 ed, some years ago, great attention, the Ec- 

 caleobion possessed a perfect and absolute com- 

 mand over temperature from 300 Fahrenheit, 

 to that of cold water, so that any substance sub- 

 mitted to its influence was uniformly acted upon 

 over its whole surface at any requisite interme- 

 diate degree within the above range, and such 

 heat maintained unaltered without trouble or 

 difficulty for any length of time. Hence, by 

 means of this absolute and complete command 

 over the temperature obtained by this machine, 

 the impregnated egg of any bird, not stale, 

 placed within its influence, at the proper degree 

 of warmth, at the expiration of its natural time 

 was elicited into life without the possibility of a 

 failure, which is sometimes the case with eggs 

 subjected to the caprice of their natural parent. 

 During the public exhibition of this instrument 

 thirty or forty thousand chickens, perhaps more, 

 were stated to have been brought into existence 

 by a single machine, which was constructed to 

 contain two thousand eggs at a given time. The 

 chickens, with proper attention and under suit- 

 able treatrri'ent, were said to grow as healthy 

 and strong as those under a parent's care. Of 

 course, artificial mothers, warmth, a dry soil, 

 and proper buildings, would be needed. What 

 might not be expected from a multiplication of 

 these machines, or their formation on a large 

 scale ! 



THE POTOLOKIAN. 



This was a similar contrivance for hatching 

 eggs by means of heated air, established a few 

 years since, on an extensive scale, in the city of 

 Brooklyn, New York, by Mr. E. Bayer, who suc- 

 ceeded admirably well, as far as the producing 

 of chickens was concerned, in the process of 

 hatching, at a loss of not over twenty to twenty- 



