56 GENERAL TREATMENT. 



for that purpose; I have always found the 

 second cross worthless. As Brahnias do not so 

 constantly show a desire to incubate, their period 

 of laying being much more extended than that 

 of Cochins, a few of these hens, (not the leggy, 

 tucked-up looking things, so often called such, 

 but short-legged, compact, well-feathered birds), 

 may with advantage be kept, to act as mothers; 

 they sit early, and are capital nurses. Farm 

 yards are seldom stocked with profitable poultry; 

 in them, too often, is the pernicious adherence to 

 the system of breeding in and in seen, in its 

 worst aspect; the result is certain degeneracy. 

 Farmers look upon poultry as a trifling and un- 

 important item in the farm stock, only to be kept 

 as layers of eggs during summer, and are quite 

 satisfied if their chickens bring a fair market 

 price. But why not rear fowls that wiU weigh 

 eight instead of four pounds? and at the same 

 cost of feediag. Surely, such weights will com- 

 mand higher prices than merely those of the 

 market, which is often supplied with birds, 

 scarcely worthy of the name of fowls. Creatures 

 of every conceivable form and colour, with long 



