feet and legs decided yellow; hackle greyish-yellow; breast, belly, and thighs black; back and shoulders rich brown; wing-coverts iridescent black; quill feathers the same, but having half of the outer web on one side of the quill mottled with white; wattles almost absent; tail iridescent black; stature lofty; voice particularly sonorous, and somewhat hoarse.

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Malay Hen.-Comb very small, but face much covered with red skin. Bill, legs, and feet yellow; head, neck, back, tail, and quills of a rich brown; the lower parts and thighs of a lighter hue; neck long; stature and carriage lofty; head small in proportion to the size of the bird."

But

It may be suspected that Malays are underrated in importance by Poultry keepers, as much as they are overrated by naturalists. The common prejudice condemns their flesh as coarse, stringy, oily, and ill-flavoured. it is a question whether many of those who pronounce this unfavourable judgment have ever dined off so costly a dish as roast Malay Fowl. It is odd, too, that what is so faulty in an unmixed state, should be highly recommended as a first cross. The yellowness of their skin may be displeasing to the eye of a purchaser; but many of the finest-flavoured Game Fowls have this quality, and both Pheasants and Guinea Fowls, when plucked for the spit, are much more uninviting in their appearance. It will be a pity if the Malays go out of fashion altogether, and become lost to the country, like the Shackbags, in consequence of the introduction of the more bepraised, and it must be confessed more generally useful, CochinChinas.

The Malay Hen lays eggs of a good size, and of a rich buff or brown colour, which are much prized by the numerous epicures who believe that this hue indicates richness of flavour—a fact which has not yet been made sensible to my own palate. The chicks are at first very strong, with yellow legs, and are thickly covered with light brown down; but, by the time they are one-third

grown, the increase of their bodies has so far outstripped that of their feathers, that they are half naked about the back and shoulders, and extremely susceptible of cold and wet. The grand secret of rearing them, is to have them hatched very early indeed, so that they may have got through this period of unclothed adolescence during the dry, sunny part of May and June, and reached nearly their full stature before the midsummer rains descend.

The disposition of Malay Hens is very variously described doubtless with truth in the different cases. One set, "long in the leg, creamy brown with darker necks, were very ill-tempered; another individual, of a rich creamy brown and grey neck, and very broad on the back, was an invaluable sitter and mother." They are much used by some to hatch the eggs of Turkeys, a task for which they are well adapted in every respect but one, which is, that they will follow their natural instinct in turning off their chicks at the usual time, instead of retaining charge of them as long as the mother Turkey would. Goslings would suffer less from such untimely desertion.

I cannot refrain from mentioning a singular habit that has been observed in some individuals of this breed. "A multitude of facts has convinced me how wonderful is the hereditary principle in the minds or instincts of animals; but some facts have made me suspect that we sometimes put down to hereditariness what is due to imitation. I will give an instance: a good observer and breeder told me he had noticed that an Eastern breed of Poultry (Malay I think) imported by Lord Powis, though then reared during several generations in this country, always went to roost for a short time in mid-day" (of course instinctively, to avoid the noontide heats at home). "Hence (if the fact be true, and I rarely believe anything without confirmation) I concluded that this habit was probably hereditary; but mentioning this fact to a lady who had some Eastern breed, she said she believed she had noticed the same peculiarity, but with this addition, that

some chickens reared under the Eastern Hen, followed (she knew not for how long) the same habit; if so, we clearly see that it may be a merely handed-down practice, and not hereditary. To test it, the Eastern eggs ought to have been hatched under a common Hen; but my first informant is now dead. This point, though trifling, is really curious."-C. D.

I certainly have noticed Hens of various breeds occasionally retiring to roost for a mid-day nap; but never knew any make a common practice of it. Domestic Fowls have this peculiar whim; when they are compelled, by rain, snow, or severe frost, to take shelter during the day, they do not retire to their dormitory, the Henhouse, where they sleep at night, but prefer some other building to which they can have access and use as a drawing-room, and from which they will adjourn to bed, when the proper time comes.

"I saw a lot of black Malay Hens in Hungerford Market, and with them a red Cock with a black breast and tail; the quills of his tail were white. I was at first inclined to think that they had a cross of the Spanish; but when I recollected to have seen Fowls of exactly the same appearance, though somewhat smaller, in Devon, I changed my opinion."-J. S. W.

THE PHEASANT-MALAY FOWL.

THIS variety may claim the sad pre-eminence of having given occasion to more disputes than any bird of its tribe, always excepting the Game Cock. It is highly valued by many farmers, not on account of its intrinsic merits, which are considerable, but because they believe it to be a cross between the Pheasant and the common Fowl, than which nothing can be more erroneous. The Pullets and Cockerels are excellent for the table, and when brought to market meet with a ready sale, less because they are really fine birds, than because the seller assures his customers, in perfect sincerity, that they are half-bred Pheasants; and the buyer readily pays his money down, thinking that he has got a nice Fowl, and a taste of Pheasant into the bargain-something like the Frenchman, who was delighted, at breakfast, on finding that he was eating a little chicken, when he had only paid for an egg.

So gross an error in Natural History ought to be cleared away, as a belief in it might cause disappointment to Poultry fanciers; and particularly since the able author of "British Husbandry" has given the weight of his authority to the notion. He speaks of the hybrid between the Hen and the Pheasant having "succeeded;" and adds: "Their flesh, however, has so much of the game flavour of the Pheasant, coupled with the juiciness of the Fowl, as to be greatly prized by connoisseurs in good eating; and therefore attempts are often made to propagate the breed by those who are careless of trouble and expense."Farming for Ladies.

To prevent this trouble and expense being thrown away, it should be clearly known that the Pheasant breed of Poultry fanciers is no more a mule between the Hen and the Pheasant, than the Cochin-China or Ostrich

Fowl is a half-bred Ostrich, or that the Bustard breed of Turkeys sprung from a commixture with the great Bustard. Dr. Latham has an Owl-pigeon and a Turkeypheasant on the same principle of nomenclature. The really half-bred Pheasant, which is indeed obtainable by trouble, expense, and, above all, by patience and perseverance, is not unfrequent in museums and collections. Any offspring of these mules is rare: so that no breed is originated; only a set of isolated monsters. Mr. Yarrell describes and figures several other mules between the Pheasant and one or two gallinaceous birds nearly allied to it. Those between the Common Fowl and the Pheasant which I have seen, bore, in their outline, great resemblance to the genus Nycthemerus, the Golden and Silver Pheasants thus supporting the position assigned to those birds by Mr. Swainson, namely, between the Fowls and the Pheasants. And the great and varied talents of that gentleman must claim respect from every student of Nature, even though they may not be complete converts to his circular system and quinary arrangement. But, in confirmation of his views, it may be urged that existence is not a chain, a simple series, as some have described it, but an infinite net-work extending in all directions, developing itself not superficially but cubically, like the spherical undulations of light that flow from every fixed star. Each animated being is a portion of this net-work; and from each, as from a centre, may be traced affinities and relationships to all surrounding beings that are endued with life.

The Nycthemerus and the mule Pheasant have tails more or less horizontal. The Hen of the PheasantMalay carries hers in a particular upright and Hen-like manner; the Cock has the curved and flowing feathers of the tail, and every other mark of true Gallism. The Pheasant-Malay Hen has semi-oval markings on the breast, and shining blue-black hackle on the neck mixed with dark brown, which do bear some distant resemblance to the plumage of a Cock Pheasant, and might give rise