24 THE CALL OF THE HEN. 



mit their predominating characteristics to their offspring; 

 that is, if the cockerel or cock bird and hens were typical 

 meat type birds, the progeny would excel along these lines. 

 Some of them would excel their parents in the production 

 of meat; they would be hardier, better feeders, would digest 

 and assimilate their food better, and consequently arrive at 

 maturity sooner, and be of better flavor and more tender, 

 and by breeding these birds along the lines laid down by 

 I. K. Felch, of Natick, Massachusetts ("line breeding" he 

 calls it), they would improve each season, so that in a num- 

 ber of years there would be a great difference in their favor 

 over their parents. If the pen was a fancy proposition and 

 had been bred some years for fancy points, the progeny 

 would show a decided improvement in a few years over their 

 parents. If the pen were the typical egg type, the progeny 

 would show an increase over their parents in stamina and 

 egg-production. I would also have shown him where the 

 birds he was breeding from were deficient in the faculty that 

 governs fecundity, or, in other words, which controls the 

 function of reproduction. 



Whittier, in "Maud Muller," says, "For of all sad words 

 of tongue or pen, the saddest are these: it might have been." 

 Yes, "it might have been." Professor Gowell might have 

 lived to give many more years of aid to the poultry world 

 and his tragic death been prevented ; but he wrote the Doctor 

 that he did not want me to come. He seemed determined 

 to solve the problem himself, and no doubt would have done 

 so if he had been as care-free from routine duties as a man 

 in his position should have been; and I charge his untimely 

 end to society. The men and women in our public institu- 

 tions who are giving their lives for the benefit of humanity 

 are not appreciated at their true value. We demand the 

 full limit of routine duties, forgetting that it is impossible 

 for a tired body to furnish sufficient nutriment to the brain 

 to solve these intricate problems that are continually con- 

 fronting them, and while we cause them to suffer mentally 

 and physically individually, we cause ourselves to suffer 

 collectively, by our parsimonious treatment of them. 



