AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
AGRICULTTJLE IN PALESTINE- 
210 
which had been domesticated several years. 
They were owned by two brothers living 
on adjoining farms, half a mile apart. They 
were suffered to range for themselves, and 
only fed as they came about the buildings in 
severe weather, visiting alternately each 
farm-house, and strolling, occasionally, for 
miles about other farms in the neighborhood. 
They made their nests in the fields, and 
groves of wood ; no care was taken of their 
eggs by their owners, and they bred and 
reared their young at will. They roosted at 
night on the high trees about the buildings, 
or on the tops of the roofs ; on being alarmed 
they would fly half a mile, or more, away, 
without alighting; would come up, when 
driven, and feed among the common poultry, 
but were shy, and could only be caught by 
being deluded into a building. In the month 
of March we obtained a young pair, male and 
female, of these birds, put them into a box, 
and brought them several hundred miles by 
railway home. They had corn in their box, 
but ate none. After arriving, we shut them 
into a small building for a few days, during 
which, although they had food and water by 
them, they did not touch it. When let out 
with our tame turkeys at the farm-house, 
they would not associate with them, but took 
to a grove of some twenty acres a hundred 
rods distant, from which we could not coax 
them ; and, after a few days, we never saw 
them again. The feathers and bones of the 
hen w'ere found a few weeks afterward, and 
the cock we neither saw nor heard of. 
At the London Agricultural Exhibition in 
Canada West, last September, we again saw 
some fine specimens, and purchased three of 
them—a two-year-old cock and hen and a 
young pullet two-thirds grown—under the 
assurance by the owner that they were thor¬ 
oughly domestic. They were noble birds, 
and the cock proved as tame as any turkey 
on the farm. The hens, however, after a 
few days loitering about the place, occasion¬ 
ally associating with our tame ones, wander¬ 
ed away, and we have not seen them since. 
The cock still remains, keeping his own 
company about the house, and has no appa¬ 
rent society with the others, other than 
roosting with them at night under a broad 
shed. He is a stately and beautiful bird, 
weighing twenty-six pounds ; comparing ac¬ 
curately with the description we have 
quoted, with the most brilliant metallic 
plumage imaginable. The peacock hardly 
outshines his changeable velvet luster, as he 
wheels about in the sun ; and he looks the 
very spirit of the American turkey in his 
own wild luxuriance. Our intention is to 
breed him with a selection of our best do¬ 
mestic hens, and rear a crop for future keep¬ 
ing. The mongrels between the wild and 
tame turkey partake of the hardy nature of 
the one, with its brilliant plumage, and the 
domestic habits of the other ; and are usual¬ 
ly an improvement in their stamina. They 
hold the plumage of their wild parent with 
remarkable truth and brilliancy, which can 
never be mistaken by a practised observer ; 
and in this particular add much to the beauty 
and uniformity of the flock. 
We have seen occasional specimens of the 
true wild turkey at our Poultry Exhibitions, 
and many which were called so, but were 
not,being evidently mongrels; as they lacked 
in full depth the peculiar bluish tinge of the 
head, the general brilliancy of plumage, the 
erect figure, the changeable metallic luster 
of the upper w r ing, and rich cinnamon band 
at the extremity of the tail—undeviating 
marks of the pure specimen, as the colored 
portraits in the volumes of Wilson and Au¬ 
dubon will show. 
The domestic turkey of America differs in 
no way, that we are aware, from that of 
England. They are of all colors, from a 
pure white, and all shades and varieties be¬ 
tween, to that of a jet black. Among the 
full colors, also, we have the bull', or copper- 
colored, and the slate, or dove-colored— 
which many fanciers prefer, simply, we be¬ 
lieve, as a matter of taste, as we have never 
discovered any superior merit either in the 
habits or flesh of such varieties. The dark 
colors are generally the heaviest and hardi¬ 
est birds. The prevailing color, however, 
where no particular preference is indulged, 
is a bronze brown, somewhat resembling 
that of the wild turkey, but less brilliant, 
and wanting in the striking marks or tints 
peculiar to that race. 
The average size of the common turkey is 
about that of the wild bird, but when care¬ 
fully bred, they exceed those weights. The 
heaviest turkeys we have ever known are 
those grown on the dry, primitive soils of 
eastern and southern New-York, Long Isl¬ 
and, New-Jersey, Pennsylvania, Connecti¬ 
cut, and Rhode-Island. It is not uncommon 
for seven or eight months cocks to weigh 
twelve to fifteen pounds, well fatted, and 
pullets to weigh ten pounds, Avhile we once 
knew a two-year-old cock to have been 
pushed to the weight of twenty-four pounds, 
and hens frequently to twelve pounds. 
These are dressed weights, prepared for the 
spit. The western birds are not so heavy, 
probably, on the average, by one-fourth— 
such is our observation. We have now, on 
our own farm in western New-York, a Con¬ 
necticut-bred three-year-old cock, of a dark 
silvery color, alive and in full flesh, weighing 
thirty-three pounds, and the young gobblers 
of seven months, of his produce, well fatted, 
weigh fifteen pounds, dressed for the spit. 
Much in the weight and perfection of tur¬ 
keys, as we have elsewhere remarked, de¬ 
pends on the age and condition of the parent 
birds, which, for the best breeding, should 
not be less, of either sex, than two years, 
and always in a full and equable condition 
of flesh. Thus kept, and the young well 
cared for, a flock of turkeys is as easily 
reared as a clutch of common barn-door 
chickens. 
A breeder of Shanghais says that one of 
these fowls, when eating corn, takes one 
peck at a time. 
A Paddy writing from the west, says, pork 
is so plenty that “ every third man you meet 
is a hog.” 
Bare-faced falsehoods—fibs told by the 
ladies in the present style of bonnets. 
We subjoin some extracts from a letter re¬ 
cently received from the Holy Land. The 
authoress—an American lady—some years 
since headed the Christian enterprize for the 
introduction of improved social and industri¬ 
al habits among the benighted denizens of 
this once enlightened and favored land. The 
effort has succeeded, thus far, beyond her 
most sanguine expectations, and we trust it 
is destined to work a radical change in the 
condition of the people by whom she is sur¬ 
rounded. The enterprize requires the fur¬ 
ther and continued aid of the benevolent, and 
we shall be happy to forward to the colony 
any gratuities that may be left for it. 
Hebrew Biarrah, Plains of Sharon, r 
Three miles north of Jaffa, > 
September 1, 1854. ; 
Dear Sirs : W T e have long had it in our 
hearts to express by letter to you our great 
obligations for your continued benevolence 
and sympathy for this humble work. Your 
tools are invaluable aid, as such implements 
are not to be obtained here. They are riot 
only the admiration of the natives, but they 
greatly excel those which we have seen, 
which have been brought by individuals from 
other countries. Almost the only kind of 
tool used by the Arabs, for garden work, is a 
heavy kind of a hoe, of common iron, with a 
short handle, shaped somewhat like an ax. 
Their plow, of which 1 suppose you have 
seen a specimen at the great Fair in New- 
York, completes their agricultural imple¬ 
ments. 
The best carpenter in Jaffa, visiting us, 
was greatly astonished to see an ax ; and an 
augur put him in raptures. Why he spent 
days to dig out small mortice-holes, with a 
rude chisel, that-an augur would perform in 
as many hours ! He begged that we would 
send to our country and obtain these articles 
for him, and he would pay the expense. 
For squaring timber for joist, and the heavy 
machinery for raising water from wells to 
irrigate their summer plantations, they have 
neither broad hatchet or ax, but a narrow 
rude adz. The execution of their work is 
consequently very primitive. We have lost 
a number of articles, as a common hatchet, 
or a good jack-knife, prove to great tempta¬ 
tions for those who can obtain them in no 
other way. 
Your plows are a wonder. They say they 
are much better than their own—but they 
can not use them ; they don’t seem to have 
the judgment to keep them in the earth, and 
turn an even furrow. One who has been 
with us two years has learned their use, and 
we trust that others will improve also. 
You may perhaps be interested to hear the 
Arab manner and routine of raising different 
crops. They have one mode and succession 
ofkinds of grain, year after year, upon the 
same soil, and from distant generations. A 
short time since they were opposed to the 
use of manure, as an innovation against the 
course of Providence, and now only use it in 
gardens. The Bedouins and Fellaheen (or 
farming peasants of the villages) plow the 
soil with camels, buffaloes, and cattle. In 
the spring they plow as often as twice and 
three times, in preparation for simsim, or 
sesima—a seed producing an excellent oil, 
preferred here for cooking and burning to 
olive oil. As soon as the rain ceases, they 
sow their seed in narrow drills, by means of 
a tube affixed to their plow. With their 
right hand they hold the single handle of their 
plow, and with their left they supply the tube 
from their lappell of seed. This work ceases 
about the first of May. Early in August it 
is ripe. The pods open so easily that they 
