food or safety for her young ones.

175. As to _fatting_ turkeys, the best way is, never to let them be poor.
_Cramming_ is a nasty thing, and quite unnecessary. Barley-meal, mixed
with skim-milk, given to them, fresh and fresh, will make them fat in a
short time, either in a coop, in a house, or running about. Boiled carrots
and Swedish turnips will help, and it is a change of sweet food. In
France they sometimes _pick turkeys alive_, to make them _tender_; of
which I shall only say, that the man that can do this, or order it to be
done, ought to be skinned alive himself.

FOWLS.

176. These are kept for two objects; their _flesh_ and their _eggs_. As to
_rearing them_, every thing said about rearing turkeys is applicable here.
They are best _fatted_, too, in the same manner. But, as to _laying-hens_,
there are some means to be used to secure the use of them in _winter_.
They ought not to be _old hens_. Pullets, that is, birds hatched in the
foregoing spring, are, perhaps, the best. At any rate, let them not be
more than _two years old_. They should be kept in a _warm_ place, and not
let out, even in the day-time, in _wet_ weather; for one good sound
wetting will keep them back for a fortnight. The dry cold, even in the
severest cold, if _dry_, is less injurious than even a little _wet_ in
winter-time. If the feathers get wet, in our climate, in winter, or in
short days, they do not get dry for a long time; and this it is that
spoils and kills many of our fowls.

177. The French, who are great egg-eaters, take singular pains as to the
_food_ of laying-hens in winter. They let them out very little, even in
their fine climate, and give them very stimulating food; barley boiled,
and given them warm; curds, _buck-wheat_, (which, I believe, is the best
thing of all except curds;) parsley and other herbs chopped fine; leeks
chopped in the same way; also apples and pears chopped very fine; oats and
wheat cribbled; and sometimes they give them hemp-seed, and the seed of
nettles; or dried nettles, harvested in summer, and boiled in the winter.
Some give them ordinary food, and, once a day, toasted bread sopped in
wine. White cabbages chopped up are very good in winter for all sorts of
poultry.

178. This is taking a great deal of pains; but the produce is also great
and very valuable in winter; for, as to _preserved_ eggs, they are things
to run _from_ and not after. All this supposes, however, a proper
_hen-house_, abou