ORIGIN OF THE AMERICAN BREEDS 9 



he believed all the breeds of western Europe to have originated from 

 the Italian races of fowls. It is a straight line from Italy to the 

 East; so it probably was the "Persian bird" which had come originally 

 from India that was carried westward to the Mediterranean and then 

 followed the tendrils of civilization westward across Europe. 



This was the stock that was carried to the shores of North America 

 by those early colonists who, turning their faces westward and 

 seeking the freedom of the New World, still cherished the fruits of 

 the Old. 



Important development of fowls in eastern Asia. Fowls also were 

 bred in China and the Malayan countries. The early travelers into 

 China particularly were astonished by the large size of the poultry. 

 It is on the origin of this large Chinese race, which is now known 

 as the Cochin, that the greatest doubt is cast on the bankiva as being 

 the parent stock. Extraordinary size as well as structural and tem- 

 peramental dififerences make it stand apart. Could birds of the 

 Cochin type have descended from the same primitive wild type as 

 the Game, the Leghorn or the Spanish of Europe? The bankiva is 

 smaller than the least of these. 



Variation in form is one of the most interesting and useful con- 

 siderations in the entire subject of origin. If races were not always 

 as they now are, what factors contributed to the changes and brought 

 about new developments? There is no animal breeder who believes 

 there can be no variation in form or departure from a previous type. 

 The most inexperienced is familiar with the fact that no two animals, 

 even when born of the same parents, are exactly alike. He knows 

 that visible deviations from the parent type may be caused by sub- 

 jecting the growing stock to poor housing, parasites and insufficient 

 food. 



Natural selection. In taking a hasty glance back into the past, it 

 appears easy enough to see modifications of type taking place as the 

 early tamed fowls adapted themselves to new conditions of life under 

 the tremendous influences of climate, food supply and the general 

 aspects of nature. But when we come to put our finger on the time 

 when a factor for size got into the germ plasm of the Cochin and 

 made the Cochin a big breed because it was within its nature to grow 

 big, we find the theory of gradual evolution and acquired characters 

 is a speculation on a phase of history that is most obscure because of 

 the lapse of time and scarcity of evidence. 



How did the size of the Cochin arise? It is easy to speculate on 

 a supposed period of transition through which the Cochin of China 

 passed — a period in which the early tamed fowls of the tropics were 

 carried into central Asia, where the vicissitudes of a rigorous climate 

 stimulated digestion, and then transplanted to the superior feeding 

 grounds of eastern Asia, where the birds were fed paddy or unhusked 

 rice, a grain in which the proteins are of a high order. But growth 

 is the result of cell division, not larger cells, but more cells; and how 



