290 
The Australasian Book of Poultry. 
on at an obtuse angle with the back ; while the hen's tail should be tightly compressed, more so than the 
cock's The sickles should be well arched, but the top feathers should be lower than the top feathers of the 
true tail. The wings should be large, but carried well up ; shoulders and tips well covered in the cocks by 
profuse hackle and saddle hackle feathers respectively. The shanks should be massive, and the thighs 
prominent. Size is an important, though much neglected feature, and the cocks should weigh at least 8 
to 9 lbs., and the hens 5 to 6 lbs. when full grown. 
" Head Points. — The head itself should be comparatively large ; beak strong, and dark horn colour, 
eyes very full and dark. The face must be red, and, according to the Standard, any white there involves 
disqualification. Most breeders, however, now object to this, and would make it a very serious defect only, 
for there are few cocks that do not go white in face as they get older. Personally, I agree with the com- 
promise adopted by the Club in Victoria, where any white is a fatal defect in the case of cockerels, and a 
serious defect in the case of older birds. 
" The cock's comb should be perfectly erect, only moderately large, and somewhat rough in texture, but 
neither so ' beefy ' nor so rough as the Minorca's. It should be relatively broad at the base, and taper off 
rapidly to the points of the spikes. A comparati\ely thin comb is a characteristic of the breed often 
ignored even by our judges. The serrations should be even, wide, and deep, about five in number, 
the largest in the middle, the outline of the whole being a rather flat arch. The back part should not 
extend far, nor should it lie along or follow closely the curve of the neck. At the same time it must not 
rise upwards. A line along the bottom, from the front over the skull to the back, should be about horizontal. 
Any folding or twisting of the front of the comb, where it rises from the middle of the upper mandible, is 
very objectionable. This occurs frequently in cockerels, who sometimes lose it, as the comb in growing 
increases in weight behind, which straightens it up. More serious faults are ' thumb marks ' and ' sprigs.' 
Birds with either of these defects should never be allowed in the breeding pen, as these faults are, I believe, 
hereditary. The comb of the hen should be similar to that of the cock ; but, instead of being altogether 
erect, should only rise from ^ to i inch, and then fall over to one side or the other. On no account should 
it fall over flat, without any rise, or lie flat in folds on the head. The lobes should be rather long and narrow, 
somewhat wider at the top than the bottom, fitting tightly, and perfectly smooth and fine in texture, and pure 
white. The wattles should be long, and fine, and red. 
"Feathering. — Andalusians should not be loose in feather (though this does not mean that they should 
be hard-feathered, like a Game Fowl), but the hackle and, in cocks, the saddle hackle should be most 
abundant. A very important point is that the body feathers should be large, so as to show plenty of the 
light ground colour inside the lacing. If they are small, the lacing of one feather comes so near that of the 
next that the beautiful contrast of the colouring is, to a great extent, hidden. All the feathers of the tail, 
including sickles and tail coverts, must be as broad as possible. 
" Colour. — As has been mentioned before, the tendency nowadays is to consider the colour points the 
most important of all, In the cocks, the top colour— ?> , that of the head, hackle. Lack, and saddle hackle 
— must be uniformly and entirely of the very darkest purple-black or black. The rusty or brownish-grey 
hackles, so often seen, constitute a fatal defect. The sickles, according to the Standard, should also be of 
this dark colour ; but many, myself among the number— and I am glad to see so great an authority as ' Silver 
Dun ' is of the same opinion — would prefer to have them of the same (lighter) hue as the ground colour. 
In the hens the head should be dark purple or black, but the hackle feathers should getlighterandmoreopenin 
the centre, so showing lacing more and more as they get down the neck and on to the shoulders. In every 
other part than those above mentioned, that is to say, on the breast and thighs, shoulders, wings, and tail of 
the cock, and every part except the top of the head of the hen, the ground colour must be of a clear, light, 
silvery blue (not grey), without any ' sootiness,' 'ticking,' or 'mossiness,' and every feather of this colour 
must be ' laced,' or edged all round — and not merely tipped — with a very distinct, well-defined, and not too 
narrow margin of the darkest blue or black. It is \ery seldom that birds are seen thus laced all over on the 
back (of the hens), wings, and tail, as well as on the breast : more rarely still is the ground colour clear and 
