August 17, 1876. ] 



JOUBNAL OF HORTICOLTUBE AND COTTAGK GABDENEB. 



153 



to make shade, and tried to put things generally on a better 

 footing. When Monday evening came, and we had once more to 

 go through the tortures of travelling home again with the Rams- 

 gate and Margate pilgrims, our unpleasant journey and disagree- 

 able reminiscences were almost forgotten when we thought that 

 we had found on arrival a poultry-yard stocked with valuable 

 birds in a very bad state, and had left them not only already 

 better in appearance, but had given directions for their future 

 welfare, so that their owner might have reason to remember that 

 he had benefited by " our bank holiday." — W. 



HOW I BEGAN BY KEEPING FOWLS AND 

 ENDED BY THE FOWLS KEEPING ME. 



"No eggs again for breakfast?" said my father. He was a 

 Btern and angry man, my father, and his quasi interrogation as 

 he surveyed the table made my mother jump. 



My mother was a mild placid woman ; and, as I said before, 

 she jumped. My father repeated the remark; and this time my 

 mother replied with a deprecatory " No." 



"I'll keep no more fowls," said my father. "Eating their 

 heads off with barley and all sorts of things, and never a spring 

 chicken nor so much as an egg for breakfast when you want it. 

 I'll have all their necks stretched to-day, and make an end of it !" 



My father was a man of few words, and my mother did not 

 care to dispute the point. His son (meaning myself) was a bit 

 of a pet, and knew it. 



" Give 'em to me, father." 



" Go on with your bread and butter," said my mother. How- 

 ever, I knew how to coax, and in the end had my way. 



My father agreed to allow me the bits of leavings from the 

 scullery and half a bushel of corn once a-week during the nest 

 three months, and he was to buy my eggs and chickens of me 

 at a fair market valuation ; and after three months I was to 

 keep them myself. On these terms I became the possessor of 

 sis hens — one Dorking, two with a cross of Game in them, and 

 three common barndoor fowls, with a barndoor cock, and at once 

 commenced operations. 



Adjoining the back kitchen we had a good-sized yard, about 

 24 feet by 20, unpaved, with a bit of a shed in one corner, half 

 of which was closed and filled with roosts as a hen house, and 

 an old plane tree in another corner which in summer gave a 

 pleasant shade. Here it. was that I stood and surveyed my 

 newly-acquired property with a pride such as Alexander never 

 felt in his conquered worlds when he wept that there were no 

 more to subdue. 



I began by digging-up half-way along one side of the sunny 

 wall of the yard a strip of earth about a yard wide, and out of 

 my pocket money at a cost of about 2s., assisted by Tom the 

 gardener's boy, fenced it in with wire to prevent the fowls from 

 encroaching; and here I planted quite a hedge of sunflowers. 

 My fence was quite a temporary affair, for as soon as the seeds 

 should have sprung up and the plantB grown to about a foot 

 high it was my intention to remove it. By favour of the groom 

 I got a barrowful of horse litter and dung, which I shot in the 

 corner near the base of the plane tree ; and for half-a-erown I 

 purchased a large barrowload of good gravel, which I disposed 

 in the middle of the yard. A row of orange boxes filled with 

 clean straw in the fowl house, each with a chalk egg in it to 

 tempt the sitter, made capital nests ; and now I was prepared to 

 commence the campaign. 



The servants could not make the hens lay, and had been con- 

 tent to throw down so much corn every day and let the fowls 

 shift for themselves. It was my turn to see what I could do, 

 and, boy as I was, I had my own ideas on the subject. 



In the morning before going to school I used to feed my flock 

 with a handful of barley mised with the scraps of bread and 

 leavings from the breakfast table, not forgetting the broken egg 

 shells, rind of bacon, and other unconsidered trifles, but which 

 to me were invaluable, the whole well cut and crumbled up into 

 a homogeneous mass, and so distributed. After one o'clock 

 dinner I used to pay them another visit, this time with the 

 remains of the potatoes and other vegetables (not such as the 

 cook would have saved, but Bimply the leavings on the plates), 

 which I used to rewarm in a saucepan over the fire with a little 

 gravy or sour milk that might be standing in the milk-jag. At 

 five o'clock another handful of barley, or, if any scraps were 

 lying about (and there were generally some), a mess similar to 

 that at mid- day. Occasionally this would be varied by the ad- 

 dition cf a little bran; and in winter I used to sop bread or 

 potatoes in warm beer which I saved from my dinner, and which 

 I found my fowls devour with extraordinary avidity. After one 

 of these feasts I was almost always rewarded with an extra lay 

 of eggs. 



I had almost forgotten to mention that a few lumps of rough 

 chalk and a piece of bay salt thrown casually down in the yard 

 were immensely appreciated by my feathered friends. 



Every week I turned over my gravel heap and my manure 

 heap, so as to afford freBh materials for my fowls to scratch in, 

 and at long intervals renewed them with half a barrow or so of 



fresh stuff. These precautions I regarded as indispensable to 

 the welfare of the poultry. 



In the winter they might be seen scratching and clucking 

 over the warm manure heap, or in summer dusting themselves 

 in the clean gravel, with all the lusuriousness of confirmed 

 Sybarites. 



Before long the results of my treatment began to show them- 

 selves in a regular supply of new-laid eggs, and when two of the 

 hens wanted to sit I purchased new-laid eggs of the Polish, 

 Spanish, and Dorking breeds to serve as the objects of their 

 maternal espeiiences. I thus improved my stock with fowls 

 reared from eggs of the finest breeds that could possibly be 

 procured. 



Whenever a fowl was seen to be ailing or moping I always 

 caught it, and after administering a couple of peppercorns or 

 some other simple remedy, kept it in a hamper by the kitchen 

 fire, a treatment which almoBt invariably proved successful. 

 Once a hen had some obstruction in her crop, which would not 

 digest, and I actually opened the crop with a lancet, cleaned it 

 out, and sewed it up again ; the hen not only surviving the 

 operation, but thriving well after. But the ailments of fowls 

 opens out too wide a subject ; for the present I want to confine 

 myself to the prescribed limits of my narrative. 



When a brood of chickens was expected to be hatched I was 

 always in attendance, and a most skilful accoucheur I came to be 

 — removing the chickens one by one from under the mother, 

 and placing them in a warm flannel near the fire, with a little 

 chopped hard-boiled egg and Embden grits, after giving each a 

 peppercorn by way of commencement. 



When all were hatched and the addled eggs thrown away, the 

 mother was put under a coop placed over a sack for warmth, 

 and for the first few nights placed indoors, till the chicks began 

 to feel their legs and run about. 



After a few days Dame Partlet was allowed to take her family 

 under her own charge, and seldom did I lose by the permission, 

 as cats were far more wary when the hen was at large than 

 when confined beneath a coop and her young ones far away from 

 her protecting wings. 



In each brood there was naturally a larger proportion of cock 

 than hen birds ; these after a certain age I used to weed out, 

 preserving the pullets and putting-up the young cockerels to 

 fatten for the table. My process of fattening was to confine the 

 young birds in coops, and feed them upon oatmeal brashed in 

 sour milk, and served-up scalding. A little salt contributes to 

 the fattening process materially. If they showed any tendency 

 to pine I would change their food, or even give them a few 

 days' run of their legs, a course which used to put the fat again 

 upon their bones, and leave them free to recommence the ortho- 

 dos fattening process. 



Now for the details. My first six months, I am free to con- 

 fess, were conducted at a loss as nearly as I can remember, as 

 follows : — 



£ s. d. 



Laying-out the ground — Fencing 2 



Gravel 3 6 



Manure 2 6 



Barley, 26 weeks at Is. per week 1 6 



Extras 5 



£1 19 



Any returns during that period I will write off as lost. During 

 this time, however, my sunflowers had come to maturity and 

 flowered. My readers may not be aware that the seeds of the 

 sunflower are the finest stimulant for poultry in existence, and 

 the avidity with which fowls will scratch round the roots of the 

 sunflower's tall stalks and pick up the seeds which fall from their 

 wide open flowers is something perfectly surprising to behold. 



Now for my gains. In the next six months I had doubled the 

 number of my laying hens, and substituted a fine Game cock 

 for the old barndoor fowl which I already had. 



During the same period I had averaged four eggs a-day, which 

 I sold to my father at Id. a-piece — and I had had four broods of 

 fine chicks — say in all twenty-eight young birds — of which six 

 were now laying, and the rest (twenty-two) had been fattened 

 and sold as fine birds at Christmas for 3s. and 3s. 6d. a-piece 

 (I did not charge my father full market prices " Men entendu," 

 but this by the way) : — 



£ !. d. 



182 days at id. per day 3 8 



22 fowls at 3s. each 3 6 



£6 6 8 



Deduct barley for 26 weeks 1 6 



Extras 10 



Cost of coops, &c 1 



Loss on previous six months 1 19 



Total £5 5 



Kett gain £118 



In the next year I had more than doubled my number of 



