THE DOMESTIC FOWL. 91 



to the good of his dependents, and is solicitous about 

 nothing else than self. 



CHOICE OF HENS. 



The hen is deservedly the acknowledged pattern of 

 maternal love. When her passion of philoprogenitive- 

 ness is disappointed by the failure or separation of her 

 own brood, she will either go on sitting, till her natural 

 powers fail, or she will violently kidnap the young of 

 another fowl, and insist upon adopting them. But all 

 hens are not alike. They have their little whims and 

 fancies, likes and dislikes, as capricious and unaccount- 

 able as those of other females. Some are gentle in 

 their manners and disposition, others sanguinary ; some 

 are lazy, others energetic almost to insanity.. Some, by 

 their very nature, are so mild and familiar, and so fond 

 of the society of man, that they can scarcely be kept 

 out of his dwelling ; others seem to say, " Thank you, 

 *but I'd rather be left to myself." 



The good qualities of hens, whether intended for lay- 

 ing or for breeding, are of no less importance to be 

 attended to, than those of the cock. To gratify the 

 curious reader, and show what the ancients thought of 

 the points of a hen, we give a quaint passage from old 

 Leonard Mascall. Following Columella and Stephanus, 

 he says, " The signes of a good henne are these : to be 

 of a tawnye colour, or of a russet, which are counted 

 the cheefest colours, and those hennes nexte which 

 hath the pens of their winges blackishe, not all blacke, 

 but parte. As for the gray and the white hens, they are 

 nothing so profitable. The henne with a tuit of feathers 

 on her head is reasonable good ; and the low featherde 

 henne also. Their heads oughte not to be great and 

 their tails ought to be in a meane, and her brest 

 large, and her body deepe and long, for the greatest 

 hennes of body, are not the aptest hennes to lay, nor 

 yet for that purpose so naturale. As for those hennes 

 which have hinder clawes, they will commonly breake 

 their egges in sitting thereon, and they sit not so surely 

 as others,' and will ofttimes eat their egges. As for 

 those hennes which doe call or crowe lyke the cocke, 



