Poultry; A Practical Guide to the Choice, Breeding, Rearing, and Management of All Descriptions of Fowls, Turkeys, Guinea-fowls, Ducks, and Geese, for Profit and Exhibition, Fourth Edition [Illustrated]

This edition features
• illustrations
• a linked Table of Contents and linked Footnotes

CONTENTS
GENERAL MANAGEMENT.
CHAPTER I. — Introduction
Neglect of Poultry-breeding — Profit of Poultry-keeping — Value to the Farmer — Poultry Shows — Cottage Poultry.
CHAPTER II. — The Fowl-House
Size of the House — Brick and Wood — Cheap Houses — The Roof — Ventilation — Light — Warmth — The Flooring — Perches — Movable Frame — Roosts for Cochin-Chinas and Brahma-Pootras — Nests for laying — Cleanliness — Fowls' Dung — Doors and Entrance-holes — Lime-washing — Fumigating — Raising Chickens under Glass.
CHAPTER III. — The Fowl-Yard
Soil — Situation — Covered Run — Pulverised Earth for deodorising — Diet for confined Fowls — Height of Wall, &c. — Preventing Fowls from flying — The Dust-heap — Material for Shells — Gravel — The Gizzard — The Grass Run.
CHAPTER IV. — Food
Table of relative constituents and qualities of Food — Barley — Wheat — Oats — Meal — Refuse Corn — Boiling Grain — Indian Corn, or Maize — Buckwheat — Peas, Beans and Tares — Rice — Hempseed — Linseed — Potatoes — Roots — Soft Food — Variety of Food — Quantity — Mode of Feeding — Number of Meals — Grass and [vi]Vegetables — Insects — Worms — Snails and Slugs — Animal Food — Water — Fountains.
CHAPTER V. — Eggs
Eggs all the Year round — Warmth essential to laying — Forcing Eggs — Soft Shells — Shape and Colour of Eggs — The Air-bag — Preserving Eggs — Keeping and Choosing Eggs for setting — Sex of Eggs — Packing Setting-eggs for travelling.
CHAPTER VI. — The Sitting Hen
Evil of restraining a Hen from sitting — Checking the Desire — A separate House and Run — Nests for sitting in — Damping Eggs — Filling for Nests — Choosing their own Nests — Choosing a Hen for sitting — Number and Age of Eggs — Food and Exercise — Absence from the Nest — Examining the Eggs — Setting two Hens on the same day — Time of Incubation — The "tapping" sound — Breaking the Shell — Emerging from the Shell — Assisting the Chicken — Artificial Mothers — Artificial Incubation.
CHAPTER VII. — Rearing and Fattening Fowls
The Chicken's first Food — Cooping the Brood — Basket and Wooden Coops — Feeding Chickens — Age for Fattening — Barn-door Fattening — Fattening-Houses — Fattening-Coops — Food — "Cramming" — Capons and Poulardes — Killing Poultry — Plucking and packing Fowls — Preserving Feathers.
CHAPTER VIII. — Stock, Breeding, and Crossing
Well-bred Fowls — Choice of Breed — Signs of Age — Breeding in-and-in — Number of Hens to one Cock — Choice of a Cock — To prevent Cocks from fighting — Choice of a Hen — Improved Breeds — Origin of Breeds — Crossing — Choice of Breeding Stock — Keeping a Breed pure.
CHAPTER IX. — Poultry Shows
The first Show — The first Birmingham Show — Influence of Shows — Exhibition Rules — Hatching for Summer and Winter Shows — Weight — Exhibition Fowls sitting — Matching Fowls — Imparting lustre to the Plumage — Washing Fowls — Hampers — Travelling — Treatment on Return — Washing the Hampers and Linings — Exhibition Points — Technical Terms.