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JOUBNAIi OF HaBTICUIiltJEE AND GOTrAGE aAEDENEE. 



[ June 27, 136S. 



POULTRY, SEE, and HOUSEHOLD CHRONICLE. 



AMONG THE CHICEE.NS; 



I HAVE just returned home from a visit of a few days' 

 duration. Whether I liave been in Cumberland or Corn- 

 wall, Suffolk or Sussex, it matters not; sufficient to say it 

 was a very pleasant visit. I like a visit of a couple of nights : 

 it is not too long nor too short — long enough to see your 

 friends, renew the intercourse, talk over all that has hap- 

 pened since you met, and not so long that you become 

 anxious about those at liome, or start with terror at the 

 sadden ringing of a bell at night, and fear a telegram to say, 

 "Baby's got the measles !" when after all it was only that 

 petted tom cat which scratched at the window, and was let in, 

 and struck against the bell hung on the shutter for fear of 

 tiieves. Two nights, that is the right length — there is 

 royal warrant for it, for the Queen's guests go for that time. 

 By the way, don't fancy that it was a visit to Her Majesty 

 — that cannot take place under the present Government. 

 " "Wiltshire Eector's " presence at Windsor would cause 

 serious alarm to the Cliancellor of the Exchequer; his grim 

 face might be laughed out of court favour — who knows ? 



Well, I had my visit and am home again, and that little 

 visit was perfection — pleasant to anticipate, pleasant to 

 enjoy, and pleasant to look back upon. All visits are not 

 80 pleasant. Thus, visits to grand houses are often horrible 

 things. WTien I was younger I was (well, we are all weak 

 when young), overjoyed to receive an invitation from a 

 grand country gentleman who lived in ducal style. I went 

 with great glee — it was weak of me, I own — but I returned 

 with greater — happy, only too happy, to escape home again. 

 That was a miserable visit. The weather was cold, and 

 damp, and dreai-y. I was put into a little draughty room, 

 opening directly upon the top of a staircase. I could not 

 during the whole morning get into my room to write or 

 read, as the housemaids apparently resided there until noon. 

 Worst of all, there was nothing to do, nowhere to go, no 

 retreat. The drawing-room, of course, was supposed to be 

 inhabited by the ladies; in the music-room they were prac- 

 tifiing ; in the library they were in full force, where one poor 

 male guest dared to be sitting writing his letters, but looked 

 very uncomfortable all the whQe. I was too shy to stay 

 there; 1 dnrst not remain in that room alone with rustling 

 ailkE — ^that room usurped (for I hold it was an usurpation), 

 by a bevy ot fair domes. Then there was no retreat; as to 

 my own room, to which ever and anon, like a terrified rabbit 

 running to his burrow, I bolted up in the hope that those 

 maids had finished, but there they were, gaunt and weasel- 

 faced — oh ! I remember them well — brandishing brooms and 

 rattling dust-pans. I savagely repeated Tennyson's lines 

 slightly altered — 



** Bitter houspmoidp, waiiine fust 1 

 Ila^tc the- clulliea upon my bed. 

 Whut! the flower of life is past! 

 Il u long btifore ye wed." 



That was a miserable visit, and I was a wretched guest. 

 What alleviations to my miseries were huge footmen match- 

 ing like twin elms, or gorgeous furniture, or dazzling plate ? 

 I had rather have had a leg of mutton to oat, a deal table, 

 with a five-pound-a-year little maid to wait on mo, and the 

 only plate my own, and that willow pattern. I shook my 

 fist at that big mansion when nearly out of sight down the 

 drive — it was a comfort to shake my fist at it, and I said 

 through my clenched teeth, " I'll never enter your door 

 again — no, never!" 



But a truce to all unpleasant things. I hold it to bo a 

 law with all agreeable guests not to hang heavy upon their 

 host's hands, and especially to get off somewhere during the 

 interval between breakfast and luncheon. " To your room, 

 eo?" " Yes, if the housemaid permits," but go somewhere. 

 Well, during my late visit 1 had somewhere to go, for my 

 host was a poultry-fancier. I went and sat " among the 

 chickens," my /ell hat, so light it was scarcely felt, on 

 my head, and my camp stool in hand. Down the garden 

 patffR were numerous coops with chickens of viirious ages 

 1'.. .-.Hg in and out. I sat me down in the front first of one 

 and then of another coop. N.B. — There was one lot of 



black ducklings ; I saved the life of a very juvenile one 

 who was lying on his back having nearly his last kick, but- 

 my hand saved him from — "kicking the bucket." A man 

 passed me while sitting among the chickens amd said, "Nice 

 gardeners them chickens be, sir." I made no answer, so 

 perhaps he thought I agreed in his dislike of the presence 

 of the little things in a garden, but I did not agree with 

 him. One hen had but one chick. " Oh, that cold spring !" 

 thought I. None had large broods. The mother of the one 

 was, of course, the most fussy of all, just as human mammas 

 are ; and very capricious and troublesome was that one, 

 just as only sons usually are. Chickens vary in temper. 

 There is the sullen chick ; the glutton who runs off with 

 what he cannot swallow. A neighbour's Hambui-gh cock 

 choked himself in that way. I long to tell the story to all 

 greedy chicks — indeed, it ought to be inserted in every 

 chicken primer. Then there is the persevering chick, who 

 at the peril of breaking his beak will break the hard crust. 

 There is also the good-tempered chick who pecks nobody, 

 and the sharp-tempered who peeks everybody ; the cuckoo- 

 like chick who turns another out of the best place, and the 

 poor little chick, feather-light, who runs — skims along, 

 rather — with his wings drooping, the very last to get home, 

 and is so thin that the coop-bars are a world too wide for 

 his lean form. He never wiU grow up. Well, then, he 

 never wUl feel the knife run into his jugular artery. " "Whom 

 the gods love die young." And if chickens vary in temper, 

 how the same vary in appearance at different ages. At 

 'first all are " things of beauty ;" Cochins, the little golden 

 fleeces ; Black Bantams, scarce chicks, little birds Marten- 

 j like ; Game with their three stripes, and long, fine, brown, 

 I polished noses ; Hambiu-ghs, speckled ; — lovely little things 

 every one of them. But as with mankind so with chickens. 

 " Beauty is but a fleeting good ;'* 



for there soon sets in the ugly age when they each and all 

 become ragged wretches. If they have access to a manurs- 

 heap, which mine have, they become dirty as well as ragged. 

 They at this age strongly resemble London street boys, with 

 a queer, thievish, sideway, cheating look, ready to gamble 

 for half-pence, or to whine out, "Please toss us a brown, 

 sir." I own I pay little attention to them. I don't think 

 they look respectable company. I had a thought of sending 

 them to the ragged-schools. I exclaim, "Are these the lovely 

 things of three weeks since ? What ! to this have ye come ?" 

 I think of Hamlet in the churchyard scene. I contemplate 

 writing a paraphi-ase of Juvenal's immortal tenth Satire 

 more Pope and Swift, and applying the famous " Expenie 



Uannibalem " to " Oh ye gods !" to chickens. Or 



I remember Hervey'a " Meditations among the Tombs." I 

 read it years ago at an old lady's, and was frightened by .a 

 cut representing a figure divided from top to toe by a straight 

 line, on one side, one half, a lovely lady dressed in the 

 height of the fashion of that day, and very beautiful, too, 

 she was; the other half a grim grinning skeleton. Under- 

 neath were the words, " Corinnawas one night at a splendid 

 ball, the next," and so on. Such a change, at least almost 

 such a change, takes place in chickens ; so evanescent is 

 chicken beauty, but unlike human beauty, save wlicn the 

 sweet-looking matron almost eclipses the slender girl one 

 knew twenty years ago. And this takes me to the field 

 beyond the garden, where the bigger chickens were, and 

 marvellously had they recovered their beauty. They were 

 Cochins every one— some lying down, others peering through 

 the long grass, showing theu' sensible-looking heads and 

 bright golden hackles ; some, the bigger, off for a stroll — no 

 mother's attendance needed by them : oh no ! quite strong, 

 and old enough to take care of themselves. How clean and 

 pretty the new-grown feathers look ! That large, light- 

 coloured pullet is exquisite in feather, the yellow straw 

 hackle and the creamy back. The hobbledehoy cockerels, 

 though ungainly, are not ugly ; and a^ the new fluff' blows 

 about on both cockerels and puUels, I perceive their beauty 

 is fast returning — the beauty of a fuller growth, not baby 

 beauty, but the beauty of youth. 



I enjoyed greatly my two mornings " among the chiokene." 

 I learned that even early in the year a brood reared in a 

 cucumber-frame was entirely lost — not one survived, owing 

 to their not having sufficient ventilation. Cochins do not 

 require warmth, and die if they have heat. 1 learned how 



