IN THE POULTRY YARD. 10- 
Breeding Pens. 
HAVE already described the simple pen in which I placed 
the Brown Leghorn cock and seven hens. It answered 
its purpose admirably, but having but one box of the 
_kind there used, I could not make any more like it. Nor, indeed, 
do I think I would have done so, if I had had them, as I felt sure 
that I could improve upon it. Again, therefore, I ransacked 
the poultry books, and general works on architecture. I even 
found books specially devoted to this branch of building (it 
scarcely deserves the name of architecture) and I studied them, 
but after all I found nothing that seemed to meet my presents wants 
so well as the small movable houses I had used a quarter of century 
before. ‘They were made of matched boards, and entirely without 
flooring. They were 4 feet 6 inches long by 3 feet 6 inches wide. 
The front was 5 feet 6 inches and the back 4 feet high. There 
‘was a door 20 inches wide and 4 feet high at one end, and a small 
window consisting of a single pane of glass 8 X 12 at the other. 
The latter might be covered during cold nights with a shutter, 
which was attached just below the window by small hinges, so that 
during the day time it could be turned down and at night it could 
be turned up, so as to cover the window, when it was held in place 
by a small button. 
There was a hole in the front, through which the birds entered, 
and this hole could be covered by a board placed on the inside and 
sliding over the opening. 
There were two roosts, made of young trees, each 3 inches in 
diameter and 3 feet 6 inches long. They were placed so as to 
divide the ground space equally. This gave 84 inches of roost— 
sufficient for ten fowls of the largest size. The roosts were mov- 
able and when it was deemed desirable to enter the house, they 
could be lifted out without trouble. At the same time they were 
