310 FANCIERS’ 
JOURNAL AND POULTRY EXCHANGE. 

an intelligent practical farmer, but his ambitious father 
wanted him to take a profession, and he said to me one day: 
‘‘ What would you do with the boy; for he is constantly 
urging me to order such or such blooded stock or improved 
tools and machinery, the history of which he learns and 
gives in his letters?” My answer was: “Let him come 
back to this home; bring to-this library the best agricul- 
tural books in the world ; instruct him to study the several 
parts, and then go out upon the farm to superintend their 
practical operation.” But before that father died he sorely 
regretted that he had urged the boy against his inclination, 
although it had all been done in true Christian kindness. 
Yet the son broke down, and, instead of occupying for a 
a home one of the finest farms in*the State, he is now the 
care of two fond sisters, whereas, as I view it, he might 
have been their support; but now even trips to Hurope.are 
unavailing, and the last I heard from them the sisters were 
bending beneath their load of care, being overtasked with 
anxiety and care on account of a much-loved brother. I 
know that it is a delicate and critical charge we have, to 
hold the minds instrusted to our training in the persons of 
our children into the right way of living; therefore we 
need great wisdom and carefulness in order to properly ad- 
just their plastic and elastic spirits to circumstances that 
they make the most of an earthly existence. There is ad- 
monition in the fact that ardent pet-loving children rarely, 
if ever, become criminals. 
But I find I have let my pen run over considerable paper, 
and I will quit, committing all that I have said to you. If 
you use it my only hope is that it do good to some of your 
numerous and intelligent readers. 
WILLIAM ATWOOD. 


(For Fanciers’ Journal.) 
TAILLESS FOWLS. 
FRIEND WADE. 
I notice in alate issue of your Journal, inquiries con- 
cerning tailless fowls. Perhaps I can give some informa- 
tion on that subject. Forty years ago I was ona visit to 
the coast of Ayrishire, in Scotland,—even then I was a fan- 
cier. There I saw the ‘‘ Rumpies,’’ as they named them. 
On inquiry, I was told that they came from Arreen, a large 
island in the Firth of Clyde, which is opposite Ardessan, a 
very wild rocky place. Years after I saw them in Argyl- 
shire, where they were not preserved as any particular breed. 
I saw them of different colors, but they were all called by 
the same name—‘‘ Rumpies.’”? They were not more plenty 
there than in Ayrishire. As to whether nature was origi- 
nally so niggardly as to afford them scarce a stump instead 
of a respectable tail, or whether like Labans cattle ‘“‘in ye 
olden time” the breeding stock is so susceptible as to be 
guided by sight of patterns in the formation of progeny, I 
cannot say, as nature may be forcibly perverted, and yet be 
nature still; but these thoughts will, if indulged, lead us to 
the inopportune, but important study of “ stirpiculture,” and 
I will return to the facts which I wish to present for your 
consideration, ‘‘like produces like.’ In the highlands of 
Scotland the women who have the care of the fowls, consider 
it a sure sign of a careless keeper, when the fowls are seen 
with long tails, and they are sure to pull them out; so would 
my mother do whenever she could catch my Games in those 
days. Now is it not possible that such a practice is the 
original cause of the progeny eventually appearing minus 
tail. It is well enough understood by Game breeders, that 

if they breed from fowls that have been out for fighting, 
that the chickens will preserve the likeness, or prove defi- 
cient in similar respects; so firmly is this believed by the 
best breeders in England, that when they select their breed- 
ing stock, they never even cut their combs. In the accep- 
tance or rejection of these ideas, of course you may use your 
own judgment. I presume the effect which I have described 
in regard to the “Rumpies,”’ may have been owing to a 
long course of treatment, by pulling out the original tails. 
I continue to regard your Journal as a very valuable 
and important adjunct to fanciers literature, and to the 
advertising necessities of breeders and dealers, owing to its 
frequent visits, and I will gladly contribute for dissemina- 
tion through its columns, any information which I may 
possess. Truly yours, 4 
Dracut, Mass., April, 1874. Nei THOMPSON. 

(For Fanciers’ Journal.) 
‘““‘WHAT I KNOW ABOUT ROUP.” — 
Havine read with much interest the article from the pen 
of T. F. Lamb, in No. 1, and also the one from J. Y. Bick- 
nell’s in No. 16, under the above caption, it may not be © 
amiss for me to give my experience with the affection. I 
rather incline to agree with Mr. Lamb, that it is the result 
of cold—perhaps not always—but I believe nine times out 
of ten it is produced by cold. Some time ago I had occa- 
sion to move my Silver Spangled Hamburgs; the day was 
pleasant with a cold wind from the north, that I had to face, 
and although I had not half a mile to go, yet before I 
reached home some of them showed signs of roup; this was 
in the morning, and by evening two-thirds of them had it 
bad. They were perfectly well when I went after them, 
and never had any symptoms of the affection before. They 
could not have been exposed to the disease, as that was im- 
possible. Again, a shutter was blown open from the win- 
dow of the house, containing Brahmas; the next day some 
of them were affected with the disease. I find the affection 
much easier managed among the Asiatics, than the more 
delicate kinds; in fact, I have no fears of it with Brahmas ~ 
or Cochins, but with the more tender kinds I find it more 
troublesome, although I have not lost one in two years, or 
since I adopted the following treatment; nor do I even re- 
move the affected one from the rest, unless the house is 
crowded, and then only for the benefit of the patient. 
I take alum pulverized, and dissolve all that I can ina 
given amount of water (say an ounce), and give the patient 
a teaspoonful at a dose, once, twice, or four times a day, 
according to the severity of attack. If canker shows itself 
in the mouth or throat, I then pulverize chlorate of potassa, 
say half a teaspoonful in the alum water, and give as above. 
This treatment in my hands has had the happiest results. 
MARLBORO, OHIO. W. H. ParpDEn. 

§G@s> The other day in San Francisco, at the foot of one of 
the wharves, a sinister-looking individual appeared with a 
sack in his hand. His mysterious movements excited sus- 
picion, and he was watched. When, as he supposed, not 
observed, he quietly slipped the sack into the water, and it 
immediately disappeared, the man rapidly making his way 
up town. The watchers, supposing that some mysterious 
tragedy had been enacted, dragged the mud, recovered the 
sack, and discovered within it—five suffocated kittens. 

