STUDYING EGGS 249 



ally cooked by the heat of the adjacent inflammations. 

 These yolks, abnormal in condition, must set up and 

 continue irritation. Strangely enough, a fowl may 

 continue to produce eggs through months after some 

 wrong condition has been induced. Even too much 

 surplus fat may crowd the eggs, and possibly be re- 

 sponsible for eggs misshapen. When they come to 

 exclusion, abnormal eggs may be twice as large as the 

 average, and increased in proportional length. They 

 may be as small as pigeons' eggs, or they may be 

 flattened into grotesque shapes, or be produced with a 

 shell not closed at one end, and having a small sac of 

 skin, containing albumen, as an added annex. They 

 may be produced with very poor, porous, soft, thin, 

 or brittle shells, or they may be rushed into the world 

 lacking the shell, which is usually the last addition to 

 the perfect egg. ■ All such are a source of loss to the 

 large market producer. 



Often, such products may mean only that the hen is 

 too fat. They may mean that the food is too stimulat- 

 ing ; in other words, that the owner is too greedy for a 

 big product, and is feeding, it may be, too much meat 

 with this end in view ; or, possibly, some " egg food " or 

 " egg tonic " which produces trouble with the egg or- 

 gans. The " double-yolked " egg, which is simply two 

 eggs within one shell, is pretty sure proof of a too hur- 

 ried process, in which the second egg perhaps follows 

 the first too closely for all the steps of the process to be 

 taken in their regular order. 



But a close study of even those eggs which we would 

 ordinarily class as " normal," because they do not differ 

 radically from the type, will show us that much needs to 



