THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN’S COMPANION, February 
1807 
315 
Silver I’nLisn.—First, Mr. Coleridge, Eton. Second, Mr. '!'. 1’. 
Edwards, Lyndhurst. Birds of IS.iO.— First, Mr. Coleridge, Eton. 
Second, Mrs. Pettat, Andover. 
Malays. —Second, Bliss Lewis, Winchester. 
Bantams (Gold-laced).— First, Mr. T. P. Blew, Cowes, Isle of Wight. 
Second, Blr. Fox, Devizes. Highly Commended, Capt. Beardmore, 
Fareham ; Blr. Antill, Portsmouth. (Beautiful class.) 
Bantams (Silver-laced).—First, Blr. Mew, Cowes, Isle of Wight. 
Second, Mr. Fox, Devizes, 
Bantams (any other variety).—First, Mr. Blew, Cowes, Isle of Wight. 
Second, Capt. Beardmore, Fareham. Highly Commended, Biarchioness 
of Winchester, Andover; Bliss Reeve, Fareham; Blr. Dorien, Fun- 
tingdon; Blr. R. James, Wallington, Fareham. Commended, Blr. 
Nugent, Southsea. (An excellent class.) 
Fowls of any other breed. —Prize, Mrs. St. John, Basingstoke 
(Sultans). Prize, Blr. West, jun., Cosham (Andalusian). Highly 
Commended, General Frederick, Winchester (Silk); Blr. Kelleway, 
liyde, Isle of Wight (Turks); Blr. Coles, Fareham (Andalusian); Blr. 
O. Nicholson, Fareham (Andalusian). Commended, Biarchioness of 
Winchester, Andover (Sultan). 
Geese (of any breed).—First, Mr. Edwards, Lyndhurst. Second, 
Blr. Leggatt, Titchfield. 
Ducks (Aylesbury).—First, Blr. R. James, Wallington, Fareham. 
1 Second, Mr. Rodbard, Bristol. Highly Commended, Mr. Edwards, 
Lyndhurst ; Blr. N. Antill, Portsmouth. Commended, Mr. H. Loe, 
1 jun., Godshill, Isle of Wight. (Very good class.) 
Ducks (Rouen).—First, Blr. Rodbard, Bristol. Second, Blr. J. 
Howard, Fareham. 
Ducks (any other variety). — First, Blr. R. James, Wallington, 
Fareham. (Buenos Ayres.) Second, Blr. R. James, Wallington, Fare¬ 
ham. (White Call.) 
Turkeys. —First and Second, Blr. Rodbard, Bristol. Highly Com¬ 
mended, Blr. J. James, Fareham. 
A Piece of Plate value Five Guineas, was awarded to Blr, Rodbard 
for the best collection of not less than four pens. 
A Piece of Plate value Two Pounds, awarded to Blr. R. James for 
the second best ditto. 
A Piece of Plate, the gift of Mr. Coleridge, of Eton College, was 
awarded to Blr. Coleridge, for the best collection of not less than four 
pens of Poland fowls, to be shown in four different classes. 
GAME FOWLS. 
As The Cottage Gardener is the acknowledged medium 
of communication between poultry fanciers, I wish to in¬ 
troduce into its pages the subject of Game fowls, and the 
rules by which they ought to be judged. I am not sanguine 
that I shall be able myself to add anything of much im¬ 
portance on this question; but I am not without hope that 
you, or some of your correspondents, may succeed iu giving 
a more definite form to the rules which ought to guide the 
decisions of the Judges in the Game classes. At present 
those decisions, it is well known, are extremely conflicting, 
and this uncertainty may, perhaps, in some measure, he 
traced to the want of a more precise definition of the 
points which ought to belong to all Game fowls, and to the 
different varieties into which they are subdivided. 
All experienced breeders of these fowls are probably agreed 
that the Game cock should have a fine head, narrow and 
long, an arched neck, great breadth in the breast, shoulders, 
and hack, the latter narrowing towards the tail; strong 
limbs, and erect carriage. The Game hen should also 
possess the same peculiarities of form, and a thin, erect, 
and perfectly straight comb. 
The two points of a fine, narrow head, and a body broad 
in the shoulders, and tapering towards the tail, are I think 
indispensable to all first-rate Game fowls; yet we constantly 
find prizes awarded to birds with heavy, coarse heads, and 
bodies not marked by the characteristic form I have 
described. Indeed, I should say that the prevailing 
tendency of Judges is to give undue weight to size and 
strength, to the neglect of more essential points. 
As a recent instance of this I might refer to the second 
prize awarded at the Crystal Palace Show, in class twenty- 
seven, for single cocks. This bird had great size, but was 
singularly coarse in the head, which alone, in my opinion, 
is a fatal defect in Game fowls. 
I will now venture to offer a few remarks on the Duck¬ 
wing and Black-breasted Red varieties, as I have had a 
larger experience of these kinds than any other. 
The Duckwing Game cock ought, I think, to have a clear 
hackle, either white or straw colour; a copper or straw- 
coloured saddle; a perfectly black breast and tail. A red 
saddle, a mottled breast, and white feathers in the tail I 
regard as inadmissible in a first-class specimen. 
The Duckwing hen should have a hackle, either white or 
white striped with black. Back and the wing when closed 
should exhibit an uniform slaty or bluish grey, with the 
delicate partridge pencilling, and the breast a rich, reddish 
brown, or what, the old breeders called a ‘‘robin breast.” 
This description, I thrnk, corresponds with that in The 
Poultry Book; but Mr, Baily, in his little work on poultry, 
says the Duckwing hen “ is a nutmeg colour.’’ No doubt 
many liens shown as Duckwings are of this colour; but 
they are far inferior in beauty to hens of the colour 1 have 
described. The brown colour so often seen on the wings of 
Duckwing hens, and the pale colour of the breast, are, in 
my opinion, considerable defects, and indicating, especially 
the brown on the wing, an admixture with the Black Red 
variety. 
I think The Poultry Book is right in giving the preference 
to blue and white legs in Duckwing fowls, as legs of this 
colour best harmonise with the plumage of the hens, and it 
is difficult, if not impossible, to breed hens of the colour 1 
have described except from the blue and wliite-legged strains. 
In the Yellow-legged Duckwings the hens are almost in¬ 
variably too brown on the wings, and the olive-legged hens 
are a duller grey than, I think, the Duckwing hen ought 
to he. 
Assuming this statement of points to be correct, there is 
no difficulty in pointing out defects in some of the Duckwing 
pens to which prizes were given at the Crystal Palace Show. 
In class twenty-five the first prize was awarded to a pen of 
yellow-legged birds. The cock had considerable white in 
the tail, and dark stripes down the hackle; the hens were 
too light in the head, and had crooked combs. The second 
prize pen were olive-legged birds. The cock a little mottled 
on the breast, and the hens not sufficiently brown on the 
breast. The birds which obtained the third prize were, I 
think, the best in the class. The hens approached very 
nearly to what I contend to he the true Duckwing colour, 
and in fineness of the head, so important a point in Game 
fowls, they surpassed all their competitors. But the second 
prize awarded, in class twenty-six (that for Duckwing 
chickens of 1856), struck me as most unaccountabie. The 
pullets were a worse match than any in the class, one being 
a very light grey and almost white on the breast; the other 
very brown on the wing, and both much too coarse iu the 
head for Game fowls. 
iu the chicken class for Black-breasted and other Reds, 
I fancy many amateurs will agree with me, that the first 
and second prizes ought to have been reversed. The 
pullets in the second prize pen were, I think, the best in the 
Show, and the whole pen, to my mind, superior to that 
which obtained the first prize. 
One prominent feature of the classes for Duckwings, and 
Black-breasted, and other Reds, at the Crystal Palace Show, 
was the very great preponderance of birds with olive legs, and 
ten out of every twelve prizes awarded to these classes were 
given to olive-legged pens. This preponderance may have 
been accidental, and I should regret if it indicated a settled 
preference of the olive-legged strains by the majority of the 
breeders of Game fowls. In the north of England the 
strains with white, yellow, and blue, or slaty legs are pre¬ 
ferred ; nor is there much difficulty in giving reasons for 
this preference, the white legs being a point of considerable 
importance estimating the culinary value of a fowl. With 
yellow legs we generally find associated superior brilliancy 
of plumage, and the blue-legged birds are equally white in 
the flesh with the white-legged strains ; but the olive-legged 
birds are less pleasing to the eye, and when dressed often 
present a greenish tinge. Moreover, there is strong pro¬ 
bability that the olive legs are not an original colour, but 
the result of a cross between the yellow and blue-legged 
strains. I, at least, have always found that the majority of 
chickens produced by this cross have olive legs, a result 
which seems to be the natural consequence of a combination 
of these two colours. But no ingenuity in crossing will 
produce either white, yellow, or blue legs unless these 
colours exist in one or both of the birds from which the 
chickens are bred, or in the stock from which the parent 
birds are derived. If I am correct in what I have advanced, 
it would seem that the competing pens, being equal, or nearly 
so, in the other points, the white, yellow, or blue-legged 
birds are entitled to be preferred to those with olive legs. 
I have permitted this communication to expand to an 
unreasonable length, and have nothing better to offer in the 
way of apology than the interest I take in the old English 
