12 



THE COMPLETE POULTRY BOOK. 



fowl reached Europe somewhere near the sixth century B. C. It h'.d traveled 

 still further westward by the time of the Christian era, for it was found in Brit- 

 ain by Julius Cffisar. In India it must have been domesticated when the Insti- 

 tutes of Manu were written; that is, according to Sir. W. Jones, 1200 B. C, but, 

 according to the later authority of Mr. H. Wilson, only 800 B. C, for the do- 

 mestic fowl is forbidden, while the wild is permitted to be eaten. » • * 



" Suffcient materials do not exist for tracing the history of the different breeds. 

 About the commencement of the Christian era. Columella mentions a five-toed, 

 fighting breed, and some provincial breeds ; but we know nothing more about 

 them. He aisp alludes to dwarf fowls ; but these cannot have been the same 

 with our Bantams, which, as Mr. Crawfurd has shown, were imported from 

 Japan into Bantam in Java. A dwarf fowl, probably the true Bantam, is re- 

 farred to in an old Japanese encyclopedia, as I am informed by Mr. Birch. In 

 the Chinese encyclopedia aboye referred to, seven breeds are mentioned, in- 

 cluding what we should now call jumpers or creepers, and likewise fowls with 

 black feathers, bones, and flesh. In the seventeenth century Aldrovandus de- 

 scribes seven or eight breeds of fowls, and this is the most ancient record from 

 which the age of our European breeds can be inferred." 



