J* FAS AND OTHER AMERICAN A REEDS. 
443 
easy also to see how the Java might very probably have been an ancestor of the Langshan ; 
whilst it is impossible to see how the Langshan could have come from North China and produced 
the Black Java. Very probably the real progenitor of both, which produced the Langshan by 
alliance with the Chinese Shanghae and some other race which imparted the pink skin between 
the toes, is older than the Java also, which may be another of its descendants ; but it was almost 
certainly a clean-legged fowl, with black and not crimson legs, and with the characteristic brown 
eye. The peculiar front edge of the comb is a modification of the same Eastern tendency which 
has developed somewhat differently in the peacomb of the Indian Game and the Brahma, and 
sometimes of the Malay ; while it is developed still further in this direction in the scarcely ser- 
. rated comb of the Sonnerat jungle-fowl, and the absolutely unserrated comb of the Gallns furcatus , 
or wild jungle-fowl, of Java itself (see Chap, xxxii.). 
For the many who want a large and hardy black fowl, but prefer clean legs to the nonde- 
script kind of feather now affected by Langshan breeders, the Java will be suitable, and will breed 
more truly than the recently made Orpingtons. There is not a great deal to guard against in 
breeding, the combs not being liable to go twisted. Some birds will be found of an awkward 
carriage, sloping downwards from the shoulders — these should be discarded, and that kind of car- 
riage, so displeasing to English eyes, bred out. There will be also the usual tendency in black 
fowls not very long carefully bred, to reddish or golden hackles, the more so as the Java cock’s 
hackle is particularly abundant and glossy. In many of the earlier notices of the Java (the period 
of “the fifties” we are especially here referring to) the fowl is described as having much red in it, 
and only breeding has extinguished this. Beyond these points, and selecting good layers and 
good combs and ears, there is very little for the breeder to trouble himself about. The hens 
are clever sitters and good mothers, not being so heavy and clumsy as Cochins and Brahmas, and 
the clean legs being less apt to do mischief than the absurdly furnished shanks of the present day. 
Like all other black fowls, the Java “sports” occasionally into white. From some of these 
sports a white Java has been produced in the United States ; and from others, or by crossing 
these whites with the black, a mottled colour, much resembling the black-and-white of the 
Houdan. In economic qualities these fowls resemble the blacks ; but in our opinion such colours 
lose all that combination of points and tout ensemble which makes the Black Java really attractive. 
The peculiar gloss, especially, which the reader of Chap, xxxii. will have no difficulty in tracing to 
the green plumage so remarkable in the wild Gallus furcatus of Java, and which it has imparted to 
the Langshan (the true worshippers at whose shrine religiously call it “sheen”), is entirely lost in 
the white and mottled varieties. 
Of other breeds we can learn little that is definite, except that they are admittedly 
inferior to the foregoing. The Danvers White was a breed formed by crossing Buff 
Cochins with White Dorkings, and had a white body with yellow bare legs. It had 
the reputation of being a good fowl for laying and hardiness, but is little known now, 
the White Leghorn having superseded it. The Jersey Blues resembled Andalusians in colour, 
and were described as having a Dorking-shaped body, but being much hardier. We 
have a strong suspicion that it may have been the Andalusian fowl itself, though some 
stray notices we have hunted up seem rather to denote a Malay character ; the Malay, 
indeed, seems to have attained a general distribution and popularity in the States under 
various names, very different to the English estimate of this breed. The name is derived from 
New Jersey ; indeed, we may remark that the local names of all American breeds, except 
Dominiques and Leghorns, are strong testimony to their local and ephemeral character. The 
