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Tiie Illustrated Book of Poultry. 
strain), and another gentleman bred a Silky in 1884. In 1885 Mr. Hamilton bred nine out of 
fifty : and Miss Croad herself reports Silkies bred in a yard she traces to Cochin blood. The 
Cochin, however, breeds this sport so much more rarely, that it appears certain they were due 
e\en in that case to the Langshan parentage rather than the other. The Silky also lays a 
pinkish egg ; and where not brown, that is the colour of the Langshards egg. That the Silky 
breeds single combs and bare legs, and that Langhans were imported with crest, and rose- 
combs, and bare legs, must also be taken into account. 
In connection with this matter must also be considered the peculiar colour of the shanks and 
feet, especially between the toes. In the standard it is described as a “ light vivid pink,” and said 
to be a “ quality rather than a colour, being the evidence of a thin skin.'” This is an error ; by 
which the advocates of the fowl really disguised or threw away a point that might have helped 
other people to see a distinction, which cannot be found in black legs alone. For many years we 
believed it on their authority, and could accordingly see no peculiar point about the leg. But 
more recently we have examined the legs of many other thin-skinned birds, through which the 
blood shows as vividly as in the Langshan, but it is of quite another colour — the usual colour of 
blood, as can be seen in the legs and feet of many Dorkings, for instance. The tint in the feet of 
the Langshan is a purplish or crimson pink ; and, having the curiosity to try the experiment, we 
found the colour gave a different spectrum from the usual colour of blood. It may be the colour of 
the Langshan blood, but it is none the less peculiar ; and, in our opinion, any bird destitute of it 
should be condemned. 
It is very interesting to notice that this colour is found in one other breed : the Houdan leg 
shows the same peculiar purple pink, which in this case is mottled with the black. It is most 
extraordinary, however, that the Houdan presents the same character of alert wildness, and is 
a fowl which also runs to two types, of rather loose , and very tight glossy plumage. Now bear 
in mind the occasional crest and rose-comb found in the Langshan occasionally, and we have 
a very strange collection of analogies, to which yet one more must be added. All black fowls 
breed occasionally both coloured, and stray white feathers ; but the Langshan has an unusual 
tendency to breed white, large splashes often appearing, and the wing-feathers being as often white 
at first as not. This startling analogy to the Houdan has struck not only ourselves, but also Mr. 
Gabb and the Rev. C. W. Hamilton, and in each case, we believe, quite independently of the others. 
Mr. Hamilton’s belief is that the Langshan was produced by a cross of the Negro Fowl 
or Gallus morio with Gallus census. We think all the facts point rather to the conclusion 
that it was a cross of some “ dark-blooded ” fowl * like the Negro Fowl with the Chinese or 
Shanghae race, itself a composite. In this way only can we understand how sometimes one type 
comes out, and now the other, largely governed by selection, and also by the crossing of unre- 
lated yards giving an impulse to reversion, as pointed out in preceding pages of this work. 
It is simply useless to deny that the Langshan originally bred and still breeds the much-abused 
Cochin type, apart from any “crossing” whatever. There are the portraits to begin with. 
Another proof is, that its breeders felt the necessity of breeding the fowl away from the original type 
most prevalent, and of altering their own standard accordingly. Thus, the legs were altered from 
“medium length ” in the 1877 standard to “ rather long” in 1888. The leg-feather was changed 
from running down the two outer toes, to the outer toe only. Most significant of all, the 1877 
standard describes the wings as “well clipped-up,” while this was altered to “carried low.” The 
* Miss Croad has written maintaining that the Langshan was probably the progenitor of the Black Java fowl, which has 
a strange resemblance in some points to it. It is manifest this cannot be, since it is well ascertained that races spread rather 
from India to China, than from China to India, and Black Javas were well known in the United States in 1850, and 
undoubtedly came from somewhere near the locality named, and not from North China at all. 
