I have lately discovered that it is not so much
the situation of the nest, as the nest itself,
which is dear to them. I had a row of nests in
wooden boxes attached together, in a front
hen-house. I found that some hens would always
lay there, and cackle with disagreeable results
as regarded the quiet of the house. A change
in my arrangements caused me to move bodily
the line of nest-boxes into a back hen-house.
The hens instantly went, each to her accustomed
nest, without any regard to the changed situation.

Jealousy, the vast fulcrum of human evil, is
in the fowls' sphere potent. How well the
young fellows—this year's birds—agree
together at first. They are as affectionate and
familiar as lads at college. Something in the
bras dessus, bras dessous style, they saunter
about, have a few friendly sparrings—mock
combats, with beak to beak, and mutually ruffled
necks, staring in each other's faces—then
suddenly run off to have a race, or lie down
in the sun, side by side, with every feather
loose to let in the grateful warmth. In this
state of young fellowship, they rather affect to
despise the company of the hens. They have
their own walks, their own small secrets.
If an old hen stalks by, I sometimes fancy
they are making sarcastic comments upon her.
Yet this very hen shall, later, prove the cause
of deadly strife. Like our human youngsters,
a young feathered gentleman always takes for
his first passion a female older than himself—
one who, in hen-life, answers to "la femme de
trente ans," immortalised by Balzac, and adored
by the lads of the Lyceum. Very likely the
Helen of the Gallic war will be the queen of the
poultry-yard, herself a dowager of four years'
standing, who at first treats the pack of cockerels
with contempt, but finally provokes even her
own lawful lord to ire, by singling out a lover
from amongst the young ones, or by alternately
playing off one young favourite against the
other. Then, no more sauntering together, or
lying in the sun. No more mock combats!
Then comes estrangement; then the real stand-up
fight; a fight of life and death. Some say:
"Let them fight it out!" But the hope of
your poultry-yard may come off minus an eye,
or minus his life. I was one day interested by
watching the determined efforts of two youug
rivals to have a duel à la mort. In order to
baffle the vigilance of the police—myself and my
gardener—they dodged about with a mutual
hostile intelligence. At last, both disappeared
from view, and, after long search, I found them
in an outhouse, both of them one gore of blood,
but both of them still fighting.

Having noted features of character mostly
common to all poultry, I need scarcely add that
fowl differs materially from fowl. We may
observe, ab ovo, not only diversities of form and
plumage, strength or weakness, but sufficient
differences of character to confound the notion
that any two creatures of any genus enter the
world quite alike. Some pugnacious little
rascals of chicks just hatched, begin to fight and
peck at their brethren, and these birds in their
little nests do not agree. Some chickens are
infant Cornaros; others incipient aldermen. Then
we have the handy, the awkward, the pert, the
slow, the grave, the funny, the mischievous, the
brisk, the sedentary, the silent, the chatterer,
the maunderer, the groaner, the social, and the
unsocial, who run away from the mob to enjoy
the pleasures of solitude. And these
characteristics, though they may be modified, are rarely
obliterated in after life.

It will be gathered from the above remarks
that the observation of poultry has its instructive
side. Indeed, it throws light on many
curious problems of animal life. Races of breeds
and hereditary endowments may be profitably
studied here. I have observed again and again
that if my stock be not continually refreshed
with new blood, there is in them a constant
tendency to dwarfing, malformation, complaints of
the head and spine; while the timely introduction
of a dunghill cock or country hen will
produce such extra life, bustle, birth, size, and
healthiness of subjects, as might be expected
among royalties should it be the fashion for
kings to marry mere mortals. Just now, the
opposite side of the question is taken by some
writers in France; but the lamentable results
which I have seen from (as it is called) breeding
in-and-in leave no doubt upon my mind that the
practice is evil.

Hereditary transmission of defect is another
curious point to observe in poultry. Peculiarities
are sent down from afar, and, if they seem to
die out, unexpectedly reappear. I have known
even a black spot inside an egg, begun by a
remote ancestress, to be continued through
many crossings down to the eggs of the most
recent generation. Another curious thing to be
remarked, is, how nature works to prevent mixed
breeds by a constant tendency to recur to some
one original type. I had at one time only two
Brahma hens (which came from eggs sent me
some hundreds of miles), no Brahma cock.
Much as I wished to multiply the Brahma
ladies, which were paired with a Cochin gentleman,
I failed to succeed in my object. The hens,
indeed, produced in each brood plenty of pure
Brahma cockerels, and plenty of pure Cochin
pullets, but conversely never. It was only after
I established a Brahma gentleman that I had
the usual proportion of males and females of
that type. It is the same with a new variety
of Cochins, called cuckoo, which is made up
from Cochins, black or white, and Poules de
Breda, which last are of uniformly barred
feathers, grey and white, almost Turkey fashion.
A pretty and curious variety are the Cochin
cuckoos, but it is almost impossible to keep the
variety steady. I find that the young are apt to
come out accordant to a single type, perfect
black or perfect white; while if the barred grey
cuckoo be successfully produced, it generally
turns out to be a male. But as regards the true
Cochin-Chinas, whose nature is to include in
their race subjects of very varied colours, you
may obtain from a pair, offspring which run
through every tint of buff, cinnamon, lemon, or