April 20. 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
with.’ The coop under this one has a cock with legs about 
a foot long apparently jointed to the back bone. AVe no¬ 
ticed both of them laid down to eat. 
“ Among the best and handsomest of fowls are the Dork¬ 
ings. The distinguishing mark of this breed is five toes. 
They are medium size, ■very symmetrical, good layers, and 
good mothers, and afford good eating 
“ The first premium pair of grey Dorkings were sold by 
Mr. McCormick for 15 dol. A cock and three hens, of very 
pretty speckled Dorkings, for 20 dol. These were bred by j 
Mr. McCormick out of L. F. Allen’s importation, and are j 
very splendid birds, though he says that those of Mr. Fail, ! 
of Westchester County, are larger, and equally entitled to the ! 
premium. A pair of white Dorkings also sold by Air. McC. ; 
for 12 dol. 
“ The Dorkings are of a size large enough for any practi- 
cal or profitable purpose, and crossed upon the game fowl, 
as Air. Allen has done, they make a very choice variety. 
“ The first premium Turkeys, owned by R. H. Avery, of 
Brooklyn, are very much admired. The male weighs 
thirty and a quarter pounds, and the female sixteen pounds, j 
They are black, and one year old past. In the same coop 
is a grey Shanghae cock for which Mr. A. paid 15 dol. He j 
sold a black Shanghae hen which laid 192 eggs within a 
year, and raised two broods of chickens in the same time. i 
“ Among the ‘ Fancy Poultry’ is a three-legged Duck. The j 
extra pedal is rigged on behind, to hold up the stern. AVe 
recommend this specimen to the peculiar attention of the 
1 fancy poultry breeders.’ If they can manage to breed on 
an outrigger of this kind to some of the monster breed of 
Shanghaes, it might save them the necessity of lying down j 
to eat, or prevent them from falling over backward while 
eating corn by reaching up to the garret windows. 
“ Shanghae Prices. —AA r e give a memorandum of a few of 
the sales which came to our knowledge, and think of 
getting up regular reports of the Shanghae market. AA'hy 
not ? since they sell for as much as some bullocks, and by 
far higher than ordinary sheep or swine. 
“We have sales of two coops of four each, Grey Shang¬ 
haes for 50 dol. a coop ; a pair of Muscovy Ducks, 12 dol ; a 
pair of Turkeys, 10 dol.; a trio of Bolton Greys, or Silver 
Hamburghs, 12 dol. 
“ Air. Platt, of Rhinebeck, sold two trio of same descrip¬ 
tion of fowls at 10 dol. a trio ; also a pair of pen fowls, 11 dol.; 
a pair (not pure) Aylesbury Ducks, 5 dol.; two trio of Dork¬ 
ings at 12 dol. or -1 dol. each ; one pair of White Shanghae, 
15 dol.; one pair of Sumatra game fowls, 40 dol.; one pair 
of Irish fowls 25 dol.; a trio of Grey Shanghaes, 30 dol.; a 
pair of African Bantams, 12 dol.; a trio of Buff Shanghaes, 
20 dol. 
“ Air Burnham of Boston sold a trio of Grey Shanghaes 
for 50 dol., and three old fowls for 100 dol. 
“ The beautiful bird called a Silver Pheasant, owned by 
Air Platt of Albany, which was much admired, was sold for 
35 dol. 
“ AYhat practical purpose he is worth thirty-five cents for 
is more than w T e know. 
“ A great many other sales have been made, but the 
above give a fair indication of 1 ruling prices.’ 
“ AA r e believe some of the fancies sell at home at those 
rates, but generally speaking, we think they are a shade 
above the market. In short, they are Shang-high prices.” 
EFFECT OF THE LAST AVINTER ON HALF- 
HARDY PLANTS. 
I am indebted to her majesty “ Queen Mali,” for the fol¬ 
lowing report of half hardy plants in her garden in Oxford¬ 
shire. Her majesty paid a visit lately to the south coast, 
probably to see that all was right about the expeditionary 
powers for the east, and she called at the Exeter nurseries 
of the Alessrs A'eitch, and Lucombe and Pince’s, “ both of 
which were well worth a visit." 
The last winter has not been so destructive among doubt¬ 
ful plauts as she expected. An Eriobotrya japonica, on a 
wall protected with fir boughs, is now “ finer in leaf than 
any I saw in Devonshire; two specimens of Solanum jasminoi- 
des are quite alive ; Benthamia fragifera is looking very well; 
Escallonia organensis and Euonymus fimhriatus, not against i 
a wall, but protected with boughs, are dead; drevillea ros- j 
marinifolia and Acacia dealbata are coming into flower ; Bud- \ 
dleya Lindlyeana stood better against a wall than it did the 1 
previous winter ; Escallonia rubra in the open shrubbery is 
safe; Stranvesia ghntcescens rather the worse, one of them 
is without a leaf; Habrothamnus fasciculatus looks rather 
dead, perhaps it will shoot up again from the roots ; Cupres- \ 
sus thurifera has been much browned by the frost; I think 
the Stauntonia latifolia and Eardizabala hibernata will have 
a squeak for their existence (but were they not very young 1 
plants ?) Air. A’eitch’s Eucalyptus coccifera is a very hand¬ 
some specimen ; he showed me a new hybrid Rhododendron, 
between jasmin iflorum and javanicnm, a pinkish colour, very 
curious looking.” 
Air. Jackson told me he had a great run for his young 
plants of Stauntonia last autumn, and if his customers did 
not keep them in pots over the winter, to be turned out this 
next Alay, they must go to the shop for it a second time. AYe 
can never press it too seriously, that these half-hardy plants 
should not be turned out after the middle of .Tune. Alay is 
the right time to plant out such plants; the soil for them 
ought to be rather poor and dry, so as not to encourage 
strong growth at first.—D. Beaton. 
WHITE SHANGHAE COCK SAA r ED BY CARE. 
A friend of mine having purchased a valuable bird of the 
above description, found,within a short time of thepurcliase, 
that he was in a fair way of losing his prize. The bird had 
been very badly kept previously to coming into his possession, 
having been deprived of his liberty, and fed on too spare a 
share of diet. Aly friend was much annoyed at the prospect 
before him, and brought the bird to me, to see if I could j 
cure it. I have no pretension to being “ Ires eonnaissant ” on 
the subject of medical practice amongst the “ Gallinacere,” ! 
but “ Common sense ’’ suggested to me, “ That the bird, 
having been half starved, and badly kept, as regards con¬ 
finement, &c., and then well fed, and allowed sufficient 
recreation, a reaction must have taken place in his system, j 
and caused the disease he was labouring under, viz., a 
suffusion of blood to the head, causing much inflammation 
and blindness, with a disgusting exudation of matter from 
the nostrils and eyes, the intense pain attending it causing 
loss of appetite and consequent weakness.” 
The friend to whom it belonged, seeming very anxious 1 
to retrieve the bird, and I equally so, to oblige him by try¬ 
ing to do so, he left the bird in my care. Here the combined 
duties of medical practioner and friend commenced on 
my part. 
I took the bird, and washed its head in luke warm water, 
cleaning out the nostrils, eyes, and beak, of the dried hu¬ 
mour and crustaceous matters which surrounded them ; re¬ 
moving, at the same time, the catarrh, or akin, from the 
tongue, commonly called “pip,” caused, I consider, by the 
disease; giving the patient, at the same time, two pills of rue 
and butter, about the size of boy’s marbles ; the bird was at 
the time so weak that it could not stand, and seemed in the 
last stages of virulent disease, approaching a speedy exit out 
of its misery and pain. I washed its head again the next 
morning, putting some crushed oats and bran down its 
throat, so as to nourish it a little. I then found that its 
crop remained hard, and that digestion was not going on as 
I could wish, so in the course of the second day I gave it 
one-third of an ounce of castor oil, and pumped on its head 
so as to allay the inflammation. Hard cheese for a sick bird, j 
some people will, doubtless, think; but I thought it was a 
kill or cure case, and excessive disease, I thought, required 
extreme measures to remove it. 
Two days after, I gave it the second one-third of an 
ounce of castor oil, having in the mean time fed the bird 
on soaked bread and a little barley and buck-wheat, by 
hand, and washed its head under the pump two or three 
times a day. 
The fifth day the bird was better, and picked up a little 
grain I threw down to it in the comer of the fowl-house, : 
where it stood moping like a great sulky boy. I then gave 
the last one-third of an ounce of castor oil, and put it out in 
