April 15. THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 39 
Keeper,” the principle of which, briefly explained, lias 
already appeared in Tiie Cottage Gardener (see vol. vii., 
page l!i). Nor is this system effectual only in respect to 
the above desirable object; but it will also effectually prevent 
the so-frequent starvation of hives from poverty of the old 
stooks in autumn; for as it provides for the issue of no 
more than one swarm per annum, it is clear that both that 
one swarm, and the parent stock, will derive great benefit 
from the increased population secured to each by the ab¬ 
sence of casting; so that, while the former shall yield a 
great spoil to the bee-master, the latter shall also lay up an 
| abundant store for all its wants in the approaching winter.— 
I A Country Curate. 
PHEASANTS. 
M. Temminck based his hopes on a wrong foundation 
when he prognosticated the silver pheasant a denizen of our 
poultry yards. No breed of pheasants, with freedom, will 
j ever become domesticated for a continuance; a few excep- 
J tions there will be, and have been, as 1 shall be enabled to 
show, but their inherent disposition is erratic ; they will go 
miles for a freak, the worst of which is, they will not come 
back again. So far as pugnacity, courage, and self-pos¬ 
session of the silver pheasant is allowed, the breed is all 
that can be desired, with this trifling exception—if he have 
not any of his own species to bully, or meet with the spirited 
resistance of some cock, his fighting propensities are so in¬ 
tolerant, mean, and cowardly withal, that he will attack the 
poor hens of the poultry-yard. And no race of savages are 
more dexterous at scalping. But I am anticipating. 
I have in my days had the care of, and entered with spirit 
for some years into, the management of poultry, in a plain 
and observant way; and, so far as it was possible, aided by 
my employer, we tried to domesticate the gold and silver 
pheasant, and the common pheasant, and the partridge also, 
but could not succeed; for no sooner did the breeding 
season arrive, than the whole race of them, if at large, 
would disappear; the common pheasant and partridge to 
the woods and fields, to live and not be recognised amongst 
their fellows ; their gaudier species to become an easy prey 
to the foxes, or otherwise, if an inkling of reward should flit 
across the minds of another description of captors, nearly 
allied, they would find their way home again in a basket, then 
to be placed in durance vile till the breeding season was over. 
Did any of my readers ever witness a pheasant’s flitting 
from an unnatural domicile ? It is delightful to witness the 
cunning of the hens (as to the cocks, it is a mere “ follow 
my leader’’), apparently conscious of the proceeding ; now 
with measured, cautious pace, under covert of some hedge; 
now scudding their way over open and exposed places, till 
they fancy themselves fairly distanced from the eye of ob¬ 
servation, is so beautifully done, at least I think so, that the 
sight can only be witnessed to be conceived. I really would 
advise a few incarcerated beings to be purposely let loose, 
in order that so rich a treat might be enjoyed. But mind, 
they must be caught doing the thing of their own accord, 
not be driven or frightened to it. 
Twenty years ago, my employer bought his original stock 
of gold and silver pheasants of the late Duke of Marl¬ 
borough, the former at ten, and the latter at seven guineas 
a brace. For some years we bred a great many for the 
London market, Mr. Castang, Am., being purchasers. Find¬ 
ing them of late years a drag on our hands, and their 
determination not to become poultry, but for ever to remain 
game ; my growing taste inclining to cows and pigs, and to 
cultivating the substantial culinary products of the garden, 
&c., the birds were disposed of, with the pheasantry and 
bantams into the bargain. 
A word in passing, for Bantams. The kind we had were 
Sir John Sebright’s golden spangled, which, from high keep, 
Ac., became quite as fine as the generality of fowls to be 
met with in a farm-yard. Taken altogether as they were, 
we have never much bettered ourselves, though we have 
been trying different breeds of poultry ever since. We have 
now a very fine, useful breed, a cross between a Japan 
Dorking cock, and hens of the brown-spangled Dorkings, 
which I think it would be difficult to beat in these parts, 
barring the Cochin-Chinas. I do not yet know if we shall 
arrive at this ugly, useful, and popular variety. 
Our poultry-yard here is circumscribed, and the quantity 
we keep (a cock and five hens), the mere shadow of our 
former self; still this number presented us with two broods 
of chicken last season, kept the house, a family of four in¬ 
dividuals, supplied with eggs, have done so the entire winter, 
and will continue to do so. I would every homestead could 
number a like quantity at least, and that their possessors, 
by proper observation and attention to their wants, induced 
them to do likewise. A great deal of useful information 
has appeared, and now that Mr. Dixon is giving us his 
experience in the pages of The Cottage Gardener, much 
more good will be forthcoming to guide the uninitiated. 
But to our pheasants. The object of my now writing is 
to back an opinion anecdotary, shadowings of my own ex¬ 
perience, upon the improbability of their ever becoming 
domesticated, strictly so to speak, and of this a twelve 
years trial impels me to say they never will. Man cannot 
subvert the instinct, implanted within them by the great 
Creator, of the tiniest of these creatures. All the petting 
and coaxing, all the tit bits, and plumpest barley in the 
world, are only appreciated for a time. A solitary cock bird 
may now and then be content to put up with this state of 
things, but only place Madame in his society, and if they do 
not decamp, it is because they cannot. If we could but 
domicile the lady pheasant there would be hope. It is 
under the brown feather that the mischief lies. 
The silver breed can, in fact, be depended upon, and may 
fairly be trusted at large from June to the beginning of 
February, with the precaution of securing them in their 
pheasantry at night, in accomplishing which there is no diffi¬ 
culty if they are accustomed to be fed there at stated intervals. 
It is really a very eastern clime affair when three or four 
cock birds start on a quarrelling expedition, which frequently 
comes off; they will mount the tallest trees in pursuit of 
each other, their screeching and peculiar guttural language 
at those times sufficiently noisy and quite inharmonious. I 
well remember two particularly pugnacious heroes, and one 
other (at least so I thought at the time), of an altogether 
milder disposition ; they bore the respective names of Bob, 
Jerry, and Logic. Now it became the chief aim of Jerry 
and Logic’s lives to worry the existence of Bob out of him, 
and it required a peculiar presence of mind in Bob to avoid 
their onslaughts. Alas ! if one could always be on one’s 
guard. Poor Bob ! how it came to pass, I know not; though 
the moment I recognised Logic’s sanguinary appearance 
one fine morning, and missed Bob, I jumped at once to a 
conclusion. I found Bob low down in the recess of a cellar 
window, Logically scalped ; the bare bone of his head minus 
the entire top-knot, skin and all. I was really very sorry 
for Bob, and the poor fellow seemed to appreciate my kind¬ 
ness as I dressed his wounds. He recovered, with the 
exception of his cranium remaining bare and blanched as a 
camel's bones in the desert; not a particle of cuticle ever 
came upon that extraordinary-looking poll again. The late 
Viscountess Dowager Bolingbroke took him with her, some 
time after his mishap, to Torquay, where sad things were 
spoken of Bob ; he made himself a complete nuisance to all 
around, and was eventually, I believe, secured, a very un¬ 
usual circumstance, by chain and collar. People from 
various causes—a fall, the lack of a horse, Ac., in the 
neighbourhood of the os frontis —are apt to suffer in their 
mental capacities; it is also on record of a man who sud¬ 
denly became a genius, he never having shown the slightest 
tendency that way before he had the good fortune to crack 
his skull! But I have often thought since that Bob was 
naturally vicious, and only awaited tho coward's opportunity 
and power to prove himself disagreeable. 
Jerry and Logic fought on, and as a mere relaxation took 
to scalping the bantams. As to anything in the shape of a 
young chicken (their own species not excepted, if they could 
get at them), they were down upon their heads in a moment, 
and would be seen marching in triumph with the unfortunate 
dead dangling from their beaks. Jerry and Logic were at 
last disposed of. 
Another outrageous fellow we had, who aimed at still 
higher game. He would watch on the tiles, over the back 
door of the house, and pounce down upon the women’s 
heads, doing destruction to caps and curl papers, and not 
unfrequently drawing blood. A broomstick at last was a 
necessary protection for any female that appeared through 
