

FANCIERS’ JOURNAL AND POULTRY EXCHANGE. 

weighs eighty-two grains, and measures nine-tenths of an 
inch in length; the other weighs ninety-eight grains, and 
measures one and one-tenth inches in length. The other 
pullet lays an egg about the same size as that of a Guinea 
fowl. 
I find your paper a welcome visitor, and should feel that 
I had lost a friend if it should cease coming. Full of in- 
terest and instruction, it is worth much more than its sub- 
scription price. Respectfully yours, 
Grorax W. BELL. 
SALISBURY, Mp., April 24, 1874. 
[The eggs arrived safely, and having doubts about them 
being perfect, we opened the larger one, and found it to 
contain nothing but the tread. They are what some people 
call ‘*cock’s eggs,’’ and are not at all uncommon. We 
have had the largest Brahmas lay them occasionally.—ED. ] 


#tems Auteresting wid Sunnsing. 
ges> A Hyde Park man has slaughtered 150 rabbits the 
past winter. 

§@g- A woman in Manchester, England, was recently 
choked to death by an oyster. 
y@s- A woman at Bolton, England, was bitten by a cat, 
and shortly afterwards symptoms of hydrophobia showed 
themselves, resulting in death. 
gBa@s- The United States of Colombia have an immense 
source of revenue in the cancho trees, which grow thickly in 
Darien. One forest is worth a million dollars. 
yge@s- An undescribed monster is said to have appeared in 
Lake Harney, Fla. Twenty feet of it was seen by the pas- 
sengers on the steamboat Lollie Boy, and it spouted water 
like a whale. 
pes> A large gondola was launched at Belfast, Me., the 
other day, that was built five miles back in the country, and 
hauled to salt water on shores by a team of 14 yoke of oxen 
and two span of horses. 
pas Major Pease of Bozeman, Montana, having failed as 
a civilizer of Indians, is domesticating buffalo, elk, moose, 
and other animals. He is breaking elk to harness, and is 
driving them before a sledge. 
ge@s> A correspondent of the Cincinnati Commercial says 
that there is no better fishing ground than at Kenawha Falls, 
West Virginia. They take there catfish, black bass, and 
pike as well as trout, mud cat, and eels. 
p@s~ In Lancaster County, recently, a boy named John 
Rhoads, while driving a pair of horses attached to a field 
roller, slipped from his seat, and falling in front of the rol- 
ler, it passed over him, crushing him to death. 
ga@s> The Massachusetts Anglers’ Association having be- 
come convinced, from the result of their investigations, that 
smelt during the spawning season are not healthy food, 
since they then are full of parasites, have procured the pas- 
sage of a law to prevent taking them at that time. 
p@s> At Lansing, Michigan, a cat recently saved a family 
of five children from being burned to death. They were 
asleep at the time the fire occured, no other person being in 
the house, when the cat, by clawing the faces of the children, 
roused them in time for them to escape the threatened dan- 
ger. 




297 

eS Boston expects that the grand stallion race for the 
championship of the United States, to be trotted at Mystic 
Park, September 15, will be the turf event of the season. 
The purse is $10,000, and four gold medals will be offered. 
bes Sturgeon fishing in the Delaware is unusually good, 
and the fishermen are doing a profitable business. Two 
dollars is the average price of a sturgeon, without the roes, 
which are removed and retained to be converted into caviare 
at one dollar each fish, by the manufacturers along the 
river. 


Did and Soll Let Departurent. 
4a All communications and contributions intended for this depart- 
ment should be addressed to HOWARD I. IRELAND, Concordville, 
Delaware County, Pa. 

GUINEA PIGS vs. RATS. 
<=KRO. S 
i IN SSK Se 
SEEING some remarks upon this subject, I wish to state that 
a friend informs me that when he kept Rabbits in a place 
much infested by rats, he employed Guinea pigs for the pro- 
tection of his young stock, knowing that there were some 
traditions on the subject. He had frequent opportunities of 
noticing the results. As soon as a rat showed itself in the 
neighborhood they at once gave battle en masse, upon the 
principle that l’union fait la force. Single encounters, how- 
ever, were by no means rare; in this case the Guinea pig 
would go about his work in a business-like manner, follow- 
ing the tactics of a ferret, and if he did not kill his foe 
would drive him bleeding from the field. Certainly, if we 
examine a fine buck Guinea pig, he seems perfectly capable 
of coping with any animal of his size, his strength and 
agility being remarkable. My own experience is as follows: 
—I used to keep Rabbits rather extensively in a large, dry, 
and well-ventilated cellar or basement, in which I had fre- 
quently seen rats. A portion of this was railed off for the 
use of newly-weaned Rabbits, a rat’s peculiar weakness, as 
fanciers know well, taking the precaution to allow two or 
three Guinea pigs to keep them company; and during the 
whole time (some two or three years) I never had a single 
one killed, and never saw the nose of a rat in my rabbitry, 
though there were plenty in the other cellars, and even holes 
communicating with the one lused. Whether their peculiar 
odor was the deterrent or not I cannotsay. I think that 
these cases show that the idea is not quite such a delusion as 
our worthy editors suppose. 
