July 28, 1881. ] 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
95 
The following is the programme of arrangements for the four remain¬ 
ing days :—Thursday, July 28th : Show opens at 10 A.M.; displays 
and lectures in the bee tent at intervals throughout the afternoon ; 
3.30 P.M., distribution of prizes by H.R.H. the Princess Christian. 
All the above meetings will take place in the Committee-room 
adjoining the Show. Friday and Saturday, July 29th and 30th : 
Show opens at 10 A.M. ; no displays or lectures will be given in the 
bee tent on these days. Monday, August 1st: Show opens at 10 A.M.; 
displays and lectures in the bee tent throughout the afternoon. Ad¬ 
mission 3 d. Members attending the Show will be required to bring 
their tickets of membership. A report of this Show, and of Mr. 
Cheshire’s lecture on “ Bees as Florists, Hybridisers, and Fruit-Pro¬ 
ducers,” will be given in our next issue. 
- Diseased Fowls for the Table d’Hote. — A daily con¬ 
temporary observes — “ All persons who are planning a tour in 
Switzerland will do well to make a note of the fact that the Swiss 
journals, for some three weeks past, have been much occupied with 
correspondence about a disease in the fowls which is causing no 
small anxiety to the hotel-keepers. It goes by the name of the 
‘ Huhner-Cholerine,’ or simply ‘ Hiihnerpest.” The demand for fowls 
for the table d'lwte is enormous during the season, and far larger than 
Switzerland itself can supply. Nearly all the great hotels purchase 
their fowls from Italy or France, and it appears that the disease 
occurs most frequently in the imported birds, has rarely been detected 
in the natives, and has almost certainly being communicated to these 
latter during their short companionship with their foreign kinsfolk. 
No one who has caught sight of a number of these wretched creatures 
during their transport over the Alps, say across the St. Gothard 
Pass, can be astonished at their sickness. They pass in the course of 
a few hours from a tropical into an arctic climate, and then descend 
again from the snow into the fiercest heat. Such changes are trying 
enough to the human pedestrian, who enjoys freedom of motion, 
which supplies some corrective. But these miserable birds, often 
poor scraggy creatures at starting, are packed together in basket- 
cages almost as closely as sardines. The sight of their heads craned 
piteously out of the holes in their prison, screeching for liberty, must 
have touched the heart of many a member of the Society for the 
Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.” 
- A Good Harvest. —The Daily News thus graphically de¬ 
scribes the advantages of a good harvest, and the description is not 
overdrawn. “ Every village and country town in the kingdom feels 
the effect of a good harvest. Everything is livelier and busier. 
There is more money going among all classes. The railways have 
more traffic and more travellers ; the shopkeepers see more cus¬ 
tomers, and the labourers are more fully employed. There are fresh 
orders for the commercial traveller when he comes round, and great 
business houses in London, Manchester, Leeds, or Birmingham report 
a lively demand for their goods. The movement, like the ripple 
made by Pope’s pebble in the peaceful lake, spreads in widening 
circles all round. From the tradesmen in the towns and villages it 
spreads to the wholesale houses, thence to the manufacturers, and 
so on to the workman, to the producer of raw material, and back to 
the farmer again. A flourishing agriculture makes a flourishing 
home trade, and a brisk home trade quickens the demand for agri¬ 
cultural products in the towns, and prices are forced up by the in¬ 
creased consumption. The food which would have had to be pur¬ 
chased has been grown at home, and the nation is the richer by the 
whole of the difference between the value of the cereal produce last 
year and that of the harvest now about to begin.” 
FANCIERS v. FARMERS. 
It is impossible for a Dorking fancier not to be interested in 
or amused at the letter of Mr. Harrison Weir, which under the 
above heading appeared in your columns of the 7th inst. Before 
now I have done the little in my power directly to call the atten¬ 
tion of poultry fanciers to what I believe to be the true type of 
Dorking, and'indirectly to influence judges to give prizs to birds 
of that type. It may be said that the question in the Dorking con¬ 
troversy is what that type is. This I cannot allow. I have never 
met with any fancier breeder who really had much doubt about it. 
The difference has been as to what defects should be considered 
disadvantages and what absolute disqualifications. Other fellow 
fanciers and breeders have taken the same course ; and we have, 
I think, been always anxious (for my own part I certainly have) 
to get the opinion of the older Dorking fanciers such as Mr. Weir. 
I am, therefore, a little astonished and indignant to read his com¬ 
parison between fanciers and farmers to the obvious disadvantage 
of the former. We fanciers have been the cause of the decline, 
aye, and the loss of a valuable breed of poultry, which we igno¬ 
rantly thought we were all the while encouraging ! I venture, 
therefore, to trespass once more upon your space, and to examine 
some of Mr. Weir’s statements and the arguments he draws from 
them, which, however, might not, I think, lead everybody to the 
same conclusions. “I know,” he says, “from long observation of 
the different stocks of poultry of farmers in Surrey, Sussex, and 
Kent, that the utmost care was taken to keep and preserve the 
breed pure and a little further on, “ At Lewes, only last week, 
a farmer’s wife asked me where to get some true-bred Dorkings, 
as she did not like the new style of bird at all for the farmyard. 
I could only answer, ‘ I wish I knew.’ ” But why, in the name of 
common sense, if these farmers took so much pains to keep this 
breed pure, have they so utterly failed that it cannot now be ob¬ 
tained even by one having such exceptional acquaintance with the 
poultry-growing districts as Mr. Weir? Why, if it was so pre¬ 
eminently excellent for the table, has it been allowed to die out 
by the caterers for the London markets ? What occult power has 
been given to the “fanciers” that have been able to drive out 
from all the farms of Surrey, Sussex, and Kent a useful and palat¬ 
able breed of poultry, and to introduce instead a coarse-fleshed 
and mongrel race ? I believe the answer to be a very simple one 
and twofold. First, that the old Dorking was a delicate bird, and 
so when not really cared for by enthusiastic fanciers, died out. 
Second, that the farmers who admired it were too careless or too 
stupid to see this, and so let it die out without making any intelli¬ 
gent attempt to improve its constitution, while retaining its ad¬ 
mittedly excellent qualities as a table fowl. 
“ Why,” says Mr. Weir, “is the true white-legged Dorking to be 
stamped out ?” Why, indeed ! But who wishes to stamp it out ? 
and who, if he wished, could do so when, according to Mr. Weir, 
it no longer exists ? But to leave behind the peculiar inferences 
which Mr. Weir draws from his own facts, I do not believe that 
there really is much difference of opinion between him and our¬ 
selves, the present fanciers and breeders of Dorkings, as to what 
a true Dorking should be. Some time ago, unfortunately, mon¬ 
grels did often appear in the prize list, and I heartily re-echo your 
correspondent’s words—“ If the prizes are for Dorkings why are 
they given to cross-breeds ?” This was the question in the mouths 
of all of us some four or five years ago. It was not we who showed 
the mongrels. Two or three exhibitors did, and the judges per¬ 
sisted in giving them the prizes. That was not our fault; we 
grumbled and exclaimed against such decisions, and finally stopped 
them. The judges, too, who made such awards were no young 
and inexperienced fanciers. The late Mr. E. Hewitt, all round a 
most excellent judge, for a time made the great mistake of select¬ 
ing for honours long-legged coarse-boned Dorkings. Again at 
Birmingham Mr. Baily one year gave second prize to a cockerel 
in the White Dorking class which was avowedly a first cross with 
a Light Brahma ; he had a pea comb and feathers on his legs. 
We fanciers suffered grievously at the time from such blunders. 
But why blame us when we did all in our power to counteract 
them, and have now made them almost impossible ? Of course 
no fancier ever bought such birds at their catalogue price of £1 
or £2 ; but we preferred giving our £10 or £20 to each other for 
unnoticed specimens. 
I do not rush into the large question whether, apart from the 
enthusiasm of “fancy,” any race is likely to be kept long pure or 
to be improved. Abler pens than mine have done justice to it; 
but I do protest, as a Dorking fancier, against the assertion that 
the present Dorking fanciers wish in any way to depart from the 
old recognised Dorking characteristics, though I believe most of 
us are glad that by careful selection we possess a really hardy 
race, which I well recollect my earliest Dorkings were not, and 
that in four months we can produce chickens of a size which 
formerly six months would hardly have given us. I do not desire 
to write with any asperity ; there are plenty of subjects in life 
for controversy without quarrelling over our amusements. I 
firmly believe that Mr. Weir and others who agree with him are 
entirely under a misapprehension as to the points which present 
Dorking fanciers breed for, and unjustly credit them with the 
vagaries of some few overworked judges. 
