The Illustrated Book of Poultry. 
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the other ; but few people care for either, and the practice is just as well omitted, especially as 
the livers make the finest curry. Some people, instead of using skewers, pass a strong thread 
through the body with a packing-needle, and tie the legs and wings down, tying the string in a 
slip-bow which can be readily undone, for the string to be removed before sending to table. A 
string may be thus used in any convenient manner, and makes a very compact-looking dish for 
table ; but we think a skewered fowl is rather more easy to carve. The French cover the fowl 
with paper while roasting, in order to get the fat into the meat instead of being burnt off ; by this 
method the fowl will bear more roasting, and when done the skin is found brown, but the meat 
beautifully white and tender. 
In trussing fowls for boiling, the legs are invariably chopped off at the hock-joint; then a cross- 
cut is made through the thigh above the hock, and the skin being carefully worked loose and lifted, 
with the aid of the finger operating through the vent, the end of the leg is coaxed under the skin or 
apron, without any further injury to it. This is a somewhat difficult operation, requiring practice 
and skill. The fowl is then neatly tied as required, some needing a string passed through them, 
and others not. 
It will be readily understood how undesirable it is that such lesions as any form of cook’s 
trussing necessitates, should be inflicted upon the body of the bird until it reaches its final 
destination ; but there is yet room for considerable improvement as regards English practice in 
“ marketing ” poultry. The ordinary crushed breast-bone is itself distinctly against “ keeping ” 
properties. Whatever may be possible in view of present prejudices, it cannot be doubted that the 
ideal to be arrived at would be the sending up to market of well-fed fowls simply plucked and 
singed, the lower intestine washed, “ shaped ” as already described, and finally tightly packed in 
linen or cotton cloths. 
The prejudice against dark legs for roasting (for boiling they certainly do look very 
unsightly) also needs to be overcome. It is not so inveterate now as formerly, the increasing 
number of people who have been to Paris having gradually spread some knowledge that 
the very best fowls there have black legs ; but there are plenty of places yet where dark-legged 
birds are at a great disadvantage. However desirable on some grounds is the preservation 
of pure pinky-white legs in the Dorking, the unmeasured terms in which controversy on that 
point was carried on some time ago has distinctly retarded this improvement, and confirmed 
stupid prejudice in this respect, an effect to be deeply regretted. Even the desire for white skin 
and flesh may be carried too far ; for the Malay is usually excellent eating, and the earliest 
descriptions of the purest strain of Dorkings — the white Dorking— years before shows were heard of, 
state that the flesh resembled “ ivory,” a term distinctly implying a perceptible tinge. Thus we see that 
almost every would-be authority has carried some pet notion too far, in insisting upon his own ideal 
of table poultry. One will have nothing but extremely delicate, small-boned fowls ; which can never 
supply the family table in a cool, humid, and densely-populated country. Another must have 
white legs ; which shuts out some of the best poultry in the world. Another rejects every 
fowl which shows any trace of yellow skin or “ yellow flesh.” Some poulterer, so long as he is 
allowed to break down his breast-bones, cares for little but mere size, if the bird is decently fat. 
Every one of these, in his own circle, judges according to his ideas ; and every one has much to 
say for his own view which deserves consideration, as we have tried to show. But no one point — 
not even white meat — is the sine qud non of a good fowl ; and one result we hope for from the 
recent development of competition in table poultry, as such, is the gradual dissemination of a 
sounder knowledge among the consuming public themselves, which shall check the vagaries of 
individual judges, and take a broader and more intelligent view of what is desirable. 
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