134 THE CALL OF THE HEN. 



laying. The farther you get away, from the crow formation 

 the better your hens will be. 



As a rule, fowls are almost twice as long coming to maturi- 

 ty in California as they are in the Eastern and Middle Western 

 States. What the reason is I suspect, but do not know, but 

 will find out in the next two years. 



No document purporting to be a copy of "Walter Hogan's 

 System" is genuine without my signature as is set hereunder: 

 Wishing you the best of success, I am, sincerely yours, 



THE WALTER HOGAN SYSTEM OF INCREASING EGG-PRODUC- 

 TION BY SELECTION AND BREEDING. 



It has been estimated that to add one-half dozen eggs to 

 the annual producing capacity of every hen in the United 

 States would result in additional returns from our poultry 

 sufficient to pay the national debt within less than a year. 

 Allowing this to be true, we are prepared to show that the 

 method of selection and breeding herein outlined is capable 

 of paying off our great debt several times during a single 

 year, without having to increase the number of hens kept a 

 single bird or the cost of keeping them a single dollar. 



The method or "discovery," we might call it has been 

 tested by the writer in every conceivable way, regardless of 

 expense, time, or trouble, and has been found absolutely fault- 

 less in every particular. It has been submitted to one Gov- 

 ernment Experiment Station (as will be shown later) w T ith the 

 same unerring results, and also to a number of the foremost 

 poultrymen of America, who fully and without exception 

 corroborate all that is claimed. 



This, you will agree with us, means a revolution in eco- 

 nomical egg-production; it means, too, that no poultryman, 

 however small his flock, can afford to go on in the old way a 

 single year longer. 



Every animal on the farm has a well-defined mission all 

 its own, outside of the general one of producing meat. The 

 great mission of the cow is to produce milk; of the sheep, wool ; 

 and the mission of the hen is evidently and pre-eminently egg- 

 production. This being the case, her value varies or should 

 vary largely with her ability to produce eggs. And still it is a 

 well-known fact that, while every farm animal has been se- 

 lected and bred for the best there was in it along its own 



