BZiMB'URGS: 116 



fed, without any additional preparation. Being a small-boned fowl they prove, 

 when carved, to be much more fleshy than might be imagined at first sight. 



"They generally roost high, and in places difficult of access, if any possible 

 chance of doing so presents itself; combined with this, if disturbed during 

 night-time, they never cease screaming violently until destroyed outright; 

 hence I haVe known many instances where midnight prowlers after hen-roosts 

 have been at once detected, or luckily prevented absconding with their booty, 

 the reiterated cries of alarm from their victims calling forth the immediate aid 

 of the proprietor. In case, too, of attack from vermin, their agility preserves 

 them from injury; for on such occasions they wiU fly like pheasants, and 

 readily take to trees or the highest buildings. 



"I have, during my somewhat lengthened experience in poultry matters, met 

 with a few isolated instances in which Hamburgs have incubated their own 

 nests of eggs steadily, and afterwards manifested the most exemplary attention 

 to their chickens; but such cases are very few, and quite opposed to the general 

 rule. 



"The Hamburgs are extremely ornamental varieties of poultry, and form 

 very striking additions when standing in groups near any homestead; this, 

 combined with their extraordinary production of eggs, the excellent quality of 

 the flesh, together with the very small amount of (fare they entail, causes them 

 to be almost universal favorites. 



"There is one drawback to the value of both Gold and Silver-Pencilled 

 Hamburgs, and that, it must be acknowledged, is a serious one. If hatched in 

 the early spring of the year, say before May, they are difficult to rear, being 

 very delicate during chickenhood, and suffering severely in cold, wet weather; 

 and the old birds are perhaps more subject to roup, if kept in damp, cold, un- 

 healthy situations than any variety of fowls, except, perhaps. Black Polish." 



In the Silver Spangled Hamburgs the plumage of both cock and hen is clear 

 white, but each feather is tipped with a large, greenish-black moon or spangle, 

 the spangles increasing in size with the feathers, and so arranged as to present 

 a rayed or starry appearance on the hackle and back,' and to form two parallel 

 bars across the wings. The ear-lobes should be white, and the beaks and^shanks blue. 



The Golden Spangled Hamburgs have the same reddish-bay and golden-bay 

 ground-color as the Golden Pencilled variety, the feathers of the neck-hackle 

 and saddle are striped.dowu the shaft with glossy, greeiiish-black; the taU is a 

 glossy black, while the other feathers end, as in the Silver Spangled variety, with 

 glossy-black spangles. 



The Spangled Hamburgs are of English origin, and are made, up of four sepa- 

 rate breeds ; namely, the Golden and Silver Mooneys, originated by the colliers, 

 hand-loom weavers and others in Lancashire, and named from the moon-shaped 

 spangles on their feathers ; and the Golden and SUmer Pheasamts, named from 

 their resemblance to the wild pheasant, and of Yorkshire origin. These breeds 

 have been amalgamated— the Golden Mooneys with the Golden Pheasants and 

 the Silver Mooneys with the Silver Pheasants— thus producing the two breeds of 

 "Spangled Hamburgs." These breeds are somewhat larger and somewhat 

 hardier in eonstitution than the Silver-pencilled Hamburgs; and equally good 

 layers, and no more inclined to sit. 



