644 



NEW ENGLAND FAE^IER. 



Dec. 



journals. Let ihe whole family, men, women, 

 and children, read newspapers. 



NATUHAIi AND AHTIFICIAL EGQ 

 HATCHINQ, 



One of the most interesting chapters in the 

 history of birds is that which describes the 

 construction and forms of their nests. Nearly 

 one-half of the five-page article on Birds in 

 the American Cyclopaedia is devoted to this 

 subject. But without any book-knowledge of 

 birds, every country boy and girl has noticed 

 the wonderful variety of materials used, and 

 the great skill displayed by birds in building 

 their incubators. A learned and grave pro 

 fessor in a London coUegs, who has made 

 bird's- nests a study, has arranged their build- 

 ers in twelve groups or classes, calling them 

 Miners, Ground-builders, Masons, Carpenters, 

 Platform-builders, Basket-makers, Weavers, 

 Tailors, Felt-makers, Cementers, Dome-build- 

 ers, and Parasites, or those that use the nests 

 of other birds. 



These different structures, thus various in 

 form, material, workmanship and location, are 

 not only most admirably adapted to the purposes 

 of hatching the eggs and rearing the young, 

 but at least one kind of bird's nests is used 

 for human food, and is sold, it is said, in 

 China for twice its weight in silver. These 

 nests are made by the sea- swallows of the 

 Malay Archipelago, which are a little smaller 

 than our swallow martin. This bird gathers 

 from the coral rocks of the sea, a glutinous 

 weed or marine fucus, which it swallows and 

 afterwards disgorges, and then with this vomit, 

 constructs its nest, which is about the size of 

 an ordinary coflFee cup. When freshly made 

 it is of waxy whiteness, and is then esteemed 

 the most valuable as an edible luxury. 



But notwithstanding the wonderful variety 

 and peifection of the modes which nature pro- 

 vides for the incubation of the eggs of the 

 diflFerent varieties of the feathered races, man 

 has sought out many inventions for hatching 

 eggs by artificial means. In Egypt they are 

 hatched in underground ovens which are 

 heated by burning a fuel made by mixing the 

 offdl of animals with water and straw, and 

 forming it into cakes. According to recent 

 statibtics publibhed by the government of that 

 country, the number of establishments for 

 hatching eggs in Lower Egypt was 105 and in 

 Upper Egypt 99. In all these establishments 



17,418,973 eggs were hatched, and 8,785,527 

 eggs were spoiled. 



Some years ago we published an account of 

 a contrivance for hatching eggs by artificial 

 heat, with an illustration of the machine or in- 

 cubator used. Some of our good practical 

 readers, who believed that the time of a live 

 Yankee man or woman ought to be worth 

 something more than a sitting hen's, cracked 

 some jokes at our expense for occupy ing the 

 columns of the Farmer with a description of a 

 substitute for the duties of an old hen. 



At the risk of a few more jokes we venture 

 to allude once more to the subject of artificial 

 incubators. We have just been examining 

 an invention which has been advertised in our 

 columns several weeks, and is now in opera- 

 tion at 26 North Market street. Its outward 

 appearance may be represented thus : — 



This is by no means a particularly attractive 

 picture. The one that we printed eeveral 

 years ago made a better show. But that 

 failed, practically, and so have all other hatch- 

 ing machines that had been invented prior to 

 this one, devised by Jacob and Henry Graves. 

 This failure resulted from an inability in the 

 machines to regulate the heat and moisture, 

 which are naturally supplied and regulated by 

 the organization and instinct of the mother 

 hen. In the old incubators, with much care 

 to regulate the heat and to moisten the eggs 

 by hand, incubation was more or less success- 

 fully effected, but the chickens seldom came 

 out of the shells in a healthy condition. The 

 outer shell was too hard, and the inner lining 

 was too dry and often adhered to the chick. 

 These fatal defects in the operation of previ- 

 ous incubators are now remedied, and the 

 Messrs. Graves claim to have succeeded in 

 producing a machine that is self regulating as 

 to heat, moisture and ventilation, and conse- 

 quently one that produce* healthy, spry and 

 lively chickens. 



