2iS Caxak/es and Cage-Birds. 



correctly measure the proportions of the bird, the whole showing incontestably the force of our 

 proposition that position and shape are interwoven to such an extent that it becomes difficult 

 to separate the consequence from the cause. The corollary to be deduced is that a satisfactory 

 " afgewerk " can only be expected to supervene upon good position. Fig. 54 is not intended 

 to illustrate " afgewerk " but position, the points in which it is defective having been admitted 

 and explained by us. 



No departure from ordinary routine is required in moulting the Belgian, but every 

 care should be taken to encourage and hasten on the work, when once begun, by keeping the 

 birds warm and free from the ill-effects of chills. If we repeated this injunction with every 

 hint we gave on moulting, we should mention it none too often to impress on the breeder 

 the great importance of this salutary caution. Occurring as it does at a season of the year 

 when the least inconvenience or risk to the bird may be anticipated, the chances of any 

 mishap attending the moult are reduced to a minimum, especially in the case of young birds, 

 as the earlier nests, at all events, will commence to shed their feathers before summer has 

 taken its departure ; and we would recommend nothing more than keeping the birds covered 

 up in enclosed flights and following the instructions given in Chapter X. The operations of 

 " flighting " and " tailing " have here, certainly, no defence based on any connection they may 

 have with improved colour, because colour is really a matter of small moment ; but candour 

 obliges us to admit that tailing is frequently practised with the object of gaining a little 

 additional length. Probably it is the rule rather than the exception — a rule more honoured 

 in the breach than the observance. The growing interest manifested in the consideration of 

 the broad question of "mutilation" — a term scarcely hterally applicable in this case except in 

 so far as it is connected with the idea of pain inflicted — in its relation to fashion or necessity, 

 an interest which we take to be one of the healthiest features the love of live stock has 

 induced, and which has narrowed the question between clearly-defined bounds through which 

 there is no loophole of escape, demands that there shall be no fencing or trifling with the 

 matter on the part of those who may be called on to express an opinion ; and our adhesion 

 to the simple principle involved, viz., that the infliction of pain is not justifiable unless a 

 direct corresponding advantage can be shown to render it a necessity, constrains us to say 

 that, failing to discover such necessity, we condemn any interference with the tail of a Belgian 

 beyond the removal of broken feathers, the restoration of sound ones being an adequate 

 compensation on the assumption that a perfect tail is not without its uses. The extremely 

 unsatisfactory state of the title-deeds by which a bird holds possession of its tail, we have 

 before commented on ; but while this fact soinetimes reduces the pain of extraction to a point 

 scarcely appreciable, we should be sorry to allow it to be used as a general argument against 

 the principle enunciated, and have no desire to countenance the insertion of the thin end of a 

 wedge which, by expansion, might do great injury and become a dangerous precedent. 



Year-old Belgians require more attention during the moult, since the work commences 

 later and is frequently protracted to a tedious length. When such is the case and it extends 

 into a time of the year unfavourable to satisfactory progress, we strongly recommend 

 artificial heat — a condition admitted on all hands to be one of the necessaries for bringing the 

 matter to a successful issue. A Canary is but a Canary, and the physical changes in one 

 variety are essentially the same in all, but the difference between the wholesale moulting of 

 some hundreds of young birds and the attention required in moulting matured specimens of 

 great value, in or out of season as the case may be, is just the difference between a sort of 

 carelessness which leaves things to take their chance and lays the blame of failure on Nature, 



