January 13. 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
289 
exliibittiJ at the annual exhibition of the “ New England 
Society,” for the improvement of domestic poultry, held on 
the 11th, 12th, 13th, and 11th days of November, Ibul, 
speaking of the Brahma Pooti'a fowls, say :—“ Some mam¬ 
moth items of this variety were shown by Dr. Bennett, S. 
0. Hatcli, and J. Parkinson, each possessing great merit. 
Mr. Hatch’s lot was entered under the head of Gray Cliitta- 
gongs, but were really pure Brahma Pootras, and decidedly 
better fowls than any Chittagongs in America. They are 
Better layers, lighter in colour, have shorter legs, more 
compact forms, larger ear-lobes, and smaller combs and 
wattles, and in eveiy respect are vastly superior to tlie 
Chittagongs. As the judges desire that every variety of fowl 
should be called by its right name, they cannot sanction the 
application of the title Chittagong to this excellent stock, 
when in reality they are perfect Brahma Pootras.” 
The novelty of these details, and the interest with which 
they will probably be regarded by many of your readers, 
must be my apology for troubling you with so long a com¬ 
munication.—AY. C. G. 
FLOWER-GARDEN PLANS —No. 3. 
Here is the first fruit of the criticism 
on the Plan No. 1. I am so unwilling 
to let it pass for another month, that I 
am under the necessity of sending it to 
the engraver by “ return of i)ost,” so 
the planting must be defen’ed for tlie 
present. In another month or two we 
may have a third plan out of the same 
original ideas as are evinced in the first; 
at any rate I shall not shrink from the 
pi-omise to plant No. 1; and this in due 
time for next summer. How is it that 
none of our young readers, who under¬ 
stand so well the planning of a piece of 
ground, mil undertake to show the 
planting of the beds ? Surely it cannot 
arise from a dread that I should criticise 
them too severely. I do not know another 
branch of our calling so eminently qua¬ 
lified to teach one the art of thintdng, as 
that of filling in, or planting, different 
de.signs on paper. Thinking is as natural 
to us as breathing the air; yet the art of 
listening and the art of thinking are more 
difllcult to learn than the art of pruning 
roses or peach -trees. Practice is the best 
master after all, and without it, all our 
principles and ideas, our plans and criti¬ 
cism, and all our illustrations, go for little 
in teaching the young ideas how to plant. 
Therefore, let me urge once more on 
the attention of our young friends to 
make the best attempts they can for 
planting our first and third plans. All 
that J insist on is, supposing the plan is 
on gravel, that figures (i be planted in 
green without llowers ; or, if the plan is on grass, that these 
sixes be planted with a low, very dai'k-llowering plant, as the 
dark variety of the double purple Scnccio or Emma Verbena, 
according to the size of the beds; Ijut the growth should 
accord with that of the plants on either side in beds 7. 
The reason for this arrangement is, that all the No. 0 
beds are so many expedients to take off the otherwise dis¬ 
proportionate size of No. 7; therefore, a colour in No. 0 
contrasting, orharmonising, with No. 7, would be like a house 
divided against itself; or, easier, if we call No. 7 a house, 
and the llowers in it a roof or thatch. No. (i being part of 
it. AVould it not look very odd to have the pai-t No. (i 
covered \vith slate, and the rest thatched with straw or 
reeds ? But you would not think it out of place to have 
Nos. 0 or 7 covered with straw, and the rest covered with 
reeds, although the colour of the straw and reeds might not 
be exactly alilee. It matters very little whether you make 
the corner figures. Nos. !), flowers, vases, a single cypress, 
or Irish yews. The rest is easily done, if you keep in 
mind that the very centre is a vase, and may be four feet 
higli or more ; therefore, the plants in the four beds. No. I, 
need not he quite so dwarf as 'the size of these would indi¬ 
cate. The leading principle of this plan is the least under¬ 
stood of all the tactics of flower gardening. I allude to the 
principle by which your company are turned right or left, 
01 ' “ all round,” before they can reach the centre, and this 
I shall illustrate by a thing in season. Suppose we have 
a country dance of sixteen couples, and that the first couple 
join hands, then down the middle and back again, and so on 
with the whole of them, what a tiresome dance it would be ; 
but not half so bad as going straight forward to the middle 
of a llower garden. The most indifferent of a whole party, 
as to tlowers, couhl not get along in the above plan without 
being compelled, as it were, to look at them, if only to see 
that he did not trample on them as he went about. 
D. Beaton. 
DISEASES OF POULTRY. 
Al’OPLUXY. 
A HEN, two ye.ars old, who had laid almost daily for 
more than a fortnight, was accidentally shut out from her 
usual nest for two days, and did not lay during that time, 
upon access to her laying place licing opened, she was ob¬ 
served to proceed thither, but in five minutes after was 
found dead upon her back. The body was sent to Mr. 
Tegetmeiei', and the following is his report, alfording one 
more warning against the mistake of high feeding breeding 
hens. 
“ I have carefully examined the hen forwarded by you. 
She was in high condition, and, for a laying hen, exti'emely 
fat; the digestive organs were perfectly healthy, both the 
[ crop and gizzard filled with food; the oviduct contained a 
perfect hard-shelled egg, which would evidently have been 
laid directly had the hen lived; there were also numerous 
immature eggs, one of which had been broken by some 
, concussion after death. All the organs contained in the 
i body wore in perfect health. Around the top of the spinal 
cord and base of the brain was a considerable quantity of 
