THE CALL OF THE HEN. 15 
Now, here we have three distinct types of fowl in almost every 
breed. We have divided these three types into six separate classes 
for each type: 
No. 1 of the typical egg type hen may lay about 36 eggs; 
No. 2 may lay about 96 eggs; 
No. 3 may lay about 180 eggs; 
No. 4 may lay about 220 eggs; 
No. 5 may lay about 250 eggs; 
No. 6 may lay about 280 eggs; 
All this is in their first laying year. 
No. 1 of the dual-purpose type hen may lay about 20 eggs; 
No. 2 may lay about 50 eggs: 
No. 3 may lay about 96 eggs; 
No. 4 may lay about 115 eggs; 
No. 5 may lay about 130 eggs; 
No. 6 may lay about 145 eggs; 
This is in thei first laying year. 
No. 1 of the typical meat type may lay from nothing to a dozen 
eggs. Nos. 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 may lay from nothing to a couple of dozen 
eggs, and, as a rule, will lay these in the spring when the crows lay. 
The reason is very plain, if we stop to think that the same natural 
laws govern all animal (and human) nature. ; 
The egg type hen is of a nervous temperament (that is why she is 
usually free from body lice, if she has a suitable place to dust in), and 
all she eats over bodily maintenance goes to the production of eggs. 
The hen of the sanguine temperament is a little more beefy, and lays 
less eggs; the hen of the bilious temperament is more beefy still, and lays 
still less eggs, while the hen of the lymphatic temperament will lay 
little or nothing, almost everything she eats going to flesh and fat. 
(The reader need borrow no trouble over the meaning of the terms 
“nervous,” ‘‘sanguine,”’ ‘‘bilious,”” and ‘lymphatic’ temperament, if he 
is not familiar with them, as the charts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 will specify 
matters so that anyone can understand the matter of selecting the dif- 
ferent grades of hens with very little study and troutkle.) 
We have said that we have divided the three grades, the egg type, 
dual-purpose type, and meat type, into six separate classes. There is, 
in fact, a seventh class, but it is so rare that we will not take it into 
consideration here, but will explain it later. But we have, in fact, made 
ninety classes of these six for convenience in selection, and the process 
could be extended indefinitely, but it would serve no needful purpose. 
Now, when we consider all these different grades in the hens of 
every breed, and the further fact that there is the same number of 
different grades in the male bird, is it any wonder that there is so much 
difference of opinion in regard to the profits derived from poultry- 
keeping? We have visited hundreds of poultry plants that numbered 
from about fifty to two thousand or more hens each. We have seen 
some flocks of five hundred that would not pay for the feed they con- 
sumed, for the simple reason that they were not the right type of hens. 
They were fine-looking, healthy meat-producers, but there was no 
earthly way possible to feed them that would induce them to lay eggs 
at any time except a few months in the spring when the crows laid, 
and eggs were cheap. The owners of some of these flocks were bright, 
brainy, vigorous business men, who tried every method that usage and 
