Black Cochins. Cuckoo Cochins. Silky Cochins. 
225 
and sand, mixed with lime, as I can get, and by so doing find no difficulty in keeping them very 
clean and healthy. The sand should be pretty sharp, and if it has been washed it would be all the 
better ; while a little of the lime with it helps to keep the whole very dry and sound.” 
It is very questionable whether lime should be used in the dust-bath, as here advised. It 
undoubtedly promotes health to do so, but it injures the plumage, and we are certain turns 
even white birds perceptibly yellow. We may add, that there is a strain of White Cochins which 
shows a reddish tinge through the plumage independent of any coloured sand. Such birds 
should be either rejected or bred from with very great caution. 
BLACK COCHINS. — Cochins of this colour were shown in the very early days of the 
Cochin mania. Some of these were sports from White, and some the product of crossing White 
and Buff, which undoubtedly, curious as the fact is, produced Blacks in more than one known 
case. These did not breed very true; but there were other strains imported direct, which bred as 
satisfactorily as other Cochins. The colour was never plentiful, however, and the difficulty of 
keeping it up was increased by the fact that yellow legs were demanded, as in other Cochins, 
whereas all the imported Black Cochins (like all black fowls) tended strongly to breed black legs. 
Owing to this cause more than any other, Black Cochins became nearly extinct, and the few left 
were of very poor quality, when the Langshans were introduced by Major Croad in 1872. We 
believe this stock to have been essentially the same, or, rather, with additional Eastern blood in 
it, as described in the next chapter ; but however this may be, it was eagerly used as fresh blood 
by the few Black Cochin breeders. The result has been not only immediate and marked improve- 
ment in Black Cochins, but a change in the fashion to black legs, which has removed the 
greatest difficulty in breeding them, and they are now often seen as good as the other varieties. 
An infusion of the Langshan may still be employed whenever required ; but the Langshan type 
has now become distinctly differentiated from the Cochin type, and care needs to be taken that the 
Cochin style and shape and fluffy feather be well preserved. 
CUCKOO COCHINS. — This variety is occasionally shown, but has little to recommend it. 
The colour may be easily gathered from our Plate of Plymouth Rocks ; the shape and other 
points should be as near as possible to good Cochins. We believe this variety to have been 
produced by crossing, as we have never yet seen birds that showed the true Cochin characters in 
perfection. This fault may be easily remedied by judicious selection of stock, and the colour can 
be bred without any difficulty ; but the result is of no particular beauty, and perhaps scarcely 
worth the trouble. 
SILKY COCHINS. — Cochins are now and then met with in which the webs of the feathers 
having no adhesion, the whole plumage assumes a silky or flossy character, like that of the silky 
fowl. It usually occurs quite accidentally, and in every case we have met with the variety has 
been Buff. By careful breeding the character can be transmitted, but we have only known one 
case in which there had been this hereditary character. Such birds are sometimes called “ Emu ” 
fowls. Except as curiosities, they are not worth perpetuating. They are generally, when handled, 
small in the body, rarely exceeding six pounds. This loss of weight we believe to be owing to the 
want of protection from cold and wet which they have to contend with, and in consequence of 
which they are generally delicate. When quite clean and dry, there is something unmistakably 
attractive about them, which is enough to account for their having some few admirers. We arc 
not at present aware of any established strain of this vaiiety. 
