The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1894-08-14

~ "a " SAS SN>S
takes a large grasshopper, she eats it
and gives her little ones the drum
sticks. Is that any kind of a way to
win the love of the young9
Not by any means whatever.
Let me pause here to say a word on
a subject to which I desire to call the
attention of my fellow ornithologists
throughout the country. and especially
in this State.
For years it has been noticed that in
tellectually the hen is failing, She is
not what she was even before the war,
and it has attracted the attention not
only Of scientists, but of the average
layman. What is the cause of the hens
intellectual retrogression9
Others may have a more plausible
theory than my own, but I submit here
this idea for what it is worth. Of course
there is no question regarding the ex-
istence of the trouble. The hen does
not shine socially as she once did. She
is moody and taciturn, and her mem
Dry is deficient. You let her get into
an inclosure through a hole, and she
will remain there and die before she
can remember where that hole is or
use it to get out through.
1t have noticed more idiotic hens
in the past two years than ever before.
Brain troubles are more noticeable.
More hens are noticed who cackle when
they have not laid an egg or who forget
to cackle when they have done so. More
hens show signs of hypochondria. The
glad and careless laugh is no longer
heard. I see more pale, languid hens
hens that are still young. yet with
an air of age and sensility, prematurely
aged and tough.
l am led to believe that there is a
cause for this, and a simple one.
A year ago 1 bought 16 plain pullets
of a man who lives at Hogg's Neck, IS
miles away. He delivered them on the
following day, he and his son bringing
them on foot in four punches of four
each, with legs tied together like a par
Gel of spring onions. For Is miles they
had come, with their heads hanging
down and the blood rushing to their
brains.
As a result, these hens are noticeable
for their impaired intellects. 1t is
almost pathetic to watch them dwadling
their lives away or cackling vacantly
to each other, while the rising genera
ton seems even more silly than the
older ones.
Where is the leading hen of the
future to come from? Where shall we
go to find the typical American hen9
These questions must some day be met
squarely, and now is the time. I ask
my fellow ornithologists to join with
me in rescuing from obstruction the
threatened ~intellects of our raising
hens.
So intellectually deficient has the
American hen become recently that
she is to day the dry nurse for the
turkey, the duck the guinea hen and
the goose. What other fowl would
quietly and even ~cheerfully hatch and
rear the castof children of other barn
yard fowls9 What warm blooded nam
NAL is so far lost to decent pride as to
become a fondling asylum for the
gander, the type and symbol of cheer
full idiocy9
What other fowl would without COM
plant forego her vacations in order to
sit for six weeks on a child's tin dog?
What other class or genus of the brute
creation, aside from Congress, is con-
tent to sit its life away without tangi
BILE result9 What mammal, aside from
the hen, will sit all summe gazing
into space and then come forth with a
radiant smile and with a radiant smile
and with nothing to show for it but a
hot doorknob or an amendments
Probably one of the most exhaustive
works on ornitholOgy, and n that
has beguiled many a weary hour for
me when the long, long summer days
hung warm and ~pulseless on the Blue
Ridge mountains, is a small volume,
or booklet, by Professor Parker, en-
titled 1.-THE Osteology of BaIaeniceps."
1t has wiped away the collected cob
webs of centuries and for one I can
truthfully say that all to me now is
clear. Ba'eniceps have no secrets now
from me. ALI one calm summer night
a few weeks ago, while a large owl in
the porte cochere of our country house
sang a solemn song, and a big beetle
weighing t~hree-fourths of a pound &C
~casionally bumped his broad forehead