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rhay be Undergoing the fattening process at one time ; at the 
other extreme is the small farmer or cottager who does not 
attempt to fatten more than a lew dozen birds. The chickens 
are readily bought up from the breeders by higglers, who some- 
times pay up to 3s. 6d. or 4s. in the spring months for well- 
grown birds nine or ten weeks old ; moreover, the regular 
senders of dead poultry to market understand the mode of pre- 
paration after killing, a point of the highest importance when 
the birds are exposed for retail sale. Inasmuch as the demand 
for chickens far exceeds the supply, there should certainly be 
room for a profitable extension of this minor industry. The 
system of fattening is nowhere carried out on more enlightened 
principles than at Iville Farm, Baynards, near Horsham, belong- 
ing to Mr. 0. E. Brooke, Master of the Poulterers’ Company, so 
that a description of the methods there pursued may be re- 
garded as illustrative of the general features of the business. 
The operations at Iville Farm are conducted on an area of 
about fifteen acres of poor grass land, which, however, is fairly 
dry. Here on a spring day a large number of hatching boxes 
or coops may be seen, arranged at regular intervals upon the 
ground, and each containing a hen, either sitting on eggs or 
with young chickens which she has hatched out. The coops 
are shifted daily to the extent of their own width, so that there 
may be a continuous succession of fresh sweet soil and that the 
fouling of the ground may be avoided. Each hen is taken out 
of her box for from fifteen to thirty minutes daily, according 
to weather, and is fastened by a string to a small peg on the 
ground in front ; this is the opportunity allowed her for exercise. 
The hatching season lasts from October to May inclusive, thus 
extending over a period of eight months. Artificial as well as 
natural methods of incubation are employed, the former more 
particularly in the winter months, when as many as five in- 
cubators may be in operation at the same time. In the rearing 
of the young birds also both artificial and natural methods are 
resorted to, the chickens being brought up under a brooder in 
the former case, and left to the care of the hen in the latter. 
For the first twenty-four hours after emerging from the egg 
the young birds get no food, neither are they tortured by the 
nostrum of forcing a peppercorn down the throat or by tearing 
off the hard scale at the end of the beak. During the first 
week their diet consists chiefly of Spratt’s chicken food, with 
which is mixed hard-boiled eggs chopped up with their shells ; 
these are the eggs which have proved to be infertile and have 
been removed from beneath the hens or the incubators. The 
chickens are next put on a more varied diet consisting of a 
