THE PLYMOUTH BOOKS. 139 



duughill cock and an Asiatic hen ; another party claiming to have used " Dom- 

 inique " and "Black Java " fowls in making the cross, etc. Upon this point the 

 editor of the PovMry World wrote as follows in March, 1876 : 



" When the smoke is cleared away it will be found that this breed (the Ply- 

 mouth Bock) has had several independent origins. As oil and potash may 

 i)e united and soap made anywhere, so hawk-colored barn-door fowls may be 

 amalgamated with some Asiatic variety in any State in the Union and Plymouth 

 Bocks formed. 



" Mr. A. H. Drake, of Stoughton, Mass., has a strain of Plymouth Bocks 

 which he has bred for about nineteen years (he does not give the exact dates), 

 which has not a drop of the Spaulding blood, nor the slightest admixture from 

 any other strain. The basis of this breed was native, hawk-colored fowls found 

 in Mr. Drake's neighborhood. Mr. Drake added something else to this basis, 

 but does not teU what. Mr. Spaulding's Plymouth Bocks were founded, in part, 

 on hawk-colored barn-door fowls. So were Mr. Upham's. We have word from a 

 Pennsylvania correspondent that on farms in Bucks county, in that State, fowls 

 have been found almost from time immemorial, that were identical with Ply- 

 mouth Books, and were produced, incidentally, by the introduction of Asiatic 

 blood into the common hawk-colored stock of the country. It must be kept in 

 mind that upon many fai-ms in all parts of the land, twenty, fifty or one hundred 

 years ago, hawk-colored fowls were common. The modem Dominque fowl is noth- 

 ing more nor less than the hawk-colored, dunghill bird, improved by cultivation. 

 For that matter so is the Leghorn a genuine Italian dunghill fowl, improved. 

 And the Brahma is simply an Asiatic dunghill fowl ; and the same may be said of 

 all the pure-bred varieties." 



In our own earlier poultry experience, in farm-yards where the old " Shanghses " 

 had been crossed upon the common dunghill fowls, fowls with the peculiar plumage 

 of the Plymouth Books were a frequent occurrence ; but no effort was made to 

 perpetuate this peculiarity, although " the old Dominica h^p " was sometimes 

 more highly esteemed than any other inhabitant of the poultry-yard. 



In further confirmation of this theory of the origin of the Plymouth Book may 

 be noted the fact that the crossing of a pure Plymouth Bock cock upon a pure 

 Light Brahma hen produces a fowl which can scarcely be distinguished from 

 the pure Plymouth Bock. 



Whatever may have been the origm of the Plymouth Bocks, however, they 

 are certainly to-dav the most popular breed of fowls in the United States, and 

 deservedly so, since" they combine more qualities valuable to the general poultry- 

 man than any other single breed. Hardy, excellent layers, early in maturing, 

 of good size, docile, and of beautiful plumage, they are pre-eminentiy the 

 farmer's fowl. 



As now bred the Plymouth Bocks are of two shades of the same blmsh-p-ay 

 color, resembling that of the Dominiques; the cooks being a few shades lighter 

 than the>ens. The cocks show a tendency to breed quite light, and the hens 

 quite dark, which destroys the uniformity of the poultry-yard, a point which it 

 is desirable to maintain when not inconsistent with more valuable features 

 The Standard requires that birds shall match in the show-pen; and, to comply 

 with this requirement it is customary to make two matings, one of uniform fowls 



