Breeding Sonne rat Jungle Fowls. 493 



at other times were penned up. I think no modification of the wild disposition could be observed, 

 further than their coming to be fed with any favourite food. 



" I know of no particular habit wherein they differ from the Domestic Fowl, unless that of 

 laying only four eggs at one laying and then wishing to sit, though they soon began to lay again 

 if not permitted to. I never remember to have heard the voice of the hen at all ; the cock's 

 peculiar crow is of course well known. I came to the conclusion that Jungle Fowl were too delicate 

 for this country. We fed them like young pheasants, on ants' eggs ; and it was difficult to get the 

 young ones to take any other food." 



Mr. John Douglas, of Clumber, Worksop, Notts, has bred the Sonnerat Fowl rather extensively, 

 and also many hybrids, which makes his experience especially valuable. He writes of them 

 in the following terms : — 



" I o-ot my stock from a pure cock and hen some years back ; and after breeding from them, I 

 put the cock to some Game Bantam hens, and some of the pullets to a Game Bantam cock. From 

 each cross I had several broods, which were much wilder in disposition than the pure Game, and in 

 general kept to the woods, always laying at a distance off among the trees. Besides the cross- 

 breds, I have bred I should think at least twenty pure Sonnerats from the original stock. 



" The pure Sonnerats always came true to colour, and did not seem to deteriorate at all in the 

 neck-hackles. They always seemed wild, and when started got up even wilder than the pheasants ; 

 and I believe would make even better sport than pheasants in cover, being quicker and more 

 difficult to hit. I may say, indeed, that one object I had was to make them an addition to our 

 shooting, or add them to our game birds as an extra variety ; and I cannot see that there would 

 have been any difficulty, but that we were so infested with foxes they got destroyed almost as 

 fast as I could breed them, which was very discouraging. 



" I found one thing which interested me about the pure Sonnerat hens or pullets, and that 

 was, that if their eggs were taken away after sitting a week, they would in eight or nine days lay 

 again. I have had them lay from nine to fifteen eggs at a time, never I think less than nine. In 

 one case I took away the eggs when the hen had sat a fortnight, and she laid again in seven days — 

 a pure wild hen. The crow of the cock is certainly different to the Game, but not so very different 

 to some Bantams. The young are very hardy and quite easily reared. If I lived in a county 

 where foxes were not preserved, I would undertake to 'swarm' a cover in three years from one pair 

 of healthy Sonnerats, I am so confident of the hardiness of the young with proper care. 



"Among the cross-bred birds I found the Sonnerat blood showed much more in the pullets 

 than the cockerels ; after eight years I can detect it in the pullets, the light-coloured quills 

 showing in the feathers of the back and breast. The cockerels from the very first cross of the 

 Sonnerat cock and Game Bantam hens (which were black-reds) had most of them lost all the 

 waxy appearance in their hackles ; and the second cross from these half-bred cockerels with the 

 black-red hens had lost nearly all signs of the cross with regard to the colour ; but you could trace 

 the blood in the shape and symmetry — perhaps more in the head than any other point. And I 

 never noticed any of the cross-bred cockerels 'throw back' to the Sonnerat colour at all, though, as 

 I have said, we can see the blood in the head now and then. But in the pullets bred the same 

 v/ay, only vice verscf, the colour seemed to remain ; and even now, after eight years, I can still see 

 the colour of the pure Sonnerat hen in seme of the pullets to a great extent, though the blood is 

 pretty much lost." ■ •- 



Finding Mr. Douglas had kept his original stock for some time in confinement, before turning 

 the birds out, we asked him for his mode of treatment under those circumstances, as more likely to 

 be of use to those who might in future desire to keep this beautiful bird. He has accordingly 



