NATURAL HABITS OF THE HEN. 
us, nor does recorded history mention other 
peoples practicing the art so far as we have 
knowledge. It would be possible for the incu¬ 
bating instinct to become dormant in the fowls 
of that country and through a correspondingly 
greater development of the egg-producing in¬ 
stinct the fowls be more highly valued and con¬ 
sequently imported into adjoining countries. 
It would be possible also, that “ natural 
selection ” would have gradually effected the 
permanent abandonment of the brooding in¬ 
stinct; the birds being preferred which were 
most prolific layers and least persistently broody, 
such preference (and consequent “selection”) 
were found among the ruins of the buried city 
of Pompeii and are now preserved in the Nation¬ 
al Museum at Naples; one of these represents 
a cock, life size, which differs little if at all in 
shape, color, etc., from the Brown Leghorn 
cock of today, the other is likewise of a Brown 
Leghorn cock but shows some sprinkling of 
white among the saddle feathers. The corres¬ 
pondent to whom we are indebted for this in¬ 
formation, writing of the common Italian fowls, 
says: “The Mediterranean races are of course 
the universal ones, and here almost exclusively 
are the Brown Leghorns, saucy, self-reliant, 
quick to assert themselves and great foragers* 
Cochins in 1843. Reproduced from Tegetmeier's Poultry Book. 
would gradually, although very slowly, weaken 
and finally destroy that instinct. In the coun¬ 
tries where artificial incubation was not practiced, 
however, fowls of incubating disposition would 
have to be kept to hatch the necessary chickens; 
and we find that very condition in Italy today, 
where can be seen, among the innumerable 
flocks of the common Italian fowls (which we in 
America know as Leghorns), here and there a 
flock of more or less mongrel Asiatics and other 
incubating varieties. 
That the common Italian fowls have changed 
little, if any, in the past two thousand years, we 
have good evidence in two fine mosaics which 
There is no attempt whatever made to maintain 
any special variety of color or marking, although 
one sees often enough typical cocks and hens 
resembling very closely the Brown leghorn 
as it exists in the United States today, yet 
since they are not selected for breeding with 
any definite object the evils of inbreeding mani¬ 
fest themselves in frequent white feathers. 
“ Nevertheless the race of the Brown Leghorn 
must be one of remarkable vigor and of great 
age. Nowhere have I seen anything like the 
modern pea-comb or rose-comb, always the 
large, well developed single comb,—and only 
rarely a white or black variety. The rose- 
13 
