154 PROFITS IN POULTRY. 
THE BLACK SPANISH FOWL. 
Doubtless there exists no breed of thoroughbred fowls 
in any country, except the Game, which can lay claim to 
priority of origin or to such an unbroken line of pure 
lineage as the Black Spanish. Nearly two thousand 
years ago Columella wrote about them; they were then 
indigenous to Spain, and not generally known in the 
Roman Empire. Faint traces of their ‘origin to the 
Phoenician colony of Carthage, through the doubtful 
media of Celtic poetry, are not sufficiently reliable of 
themselves to substantiate the claim. 
The Black Spanish is possibly the fourth in the order 
of Galline, or, in other words, the fourth distinct variety 
of the Gallus bankiva. Time has effected but little 
change in them during those years of close breeding. 
The same vital element, the same stamina, and the same 
power of reproducing their like in plumage, contour, 
symmetry, carriage, and facial markings are as character- 
istic of the breed to-day as they were of them in past cen- 
turies. Some writers assert several varieties of the Black 
Spanish, as the Minorca, Red-faced, Black, the White. 
the Blue, Andalusian, and the Gray or Mottled Ancona. 
Although each of these varieties was produced by the 
amalgamation of the Black Spanish with other provin- — 
cial breeds, yet, strictly speaking, each is definitely classed 
by the best-informed Spanish breeders as distinct varie- 
ties, inasmuch as they belong to the Mediterranean 
islands and provinces of Spain. Their resemblance to 
the Spanish is indeed close. Affimity no doubt exists; 
but nowadays, when skillful discriminations, careful 
selections, and thorough breeding produce those nice 
and fine points not found in the original congenitors, 
the progeny in time assumes distinctive features, plum- 
age, and peculiar characteristics. soas to be considered a 
