Page:An Encyclopædia of Cottage, Farm, and Villa Architecture and Furniture.djvu/416

 392 COTTAGE, FARM, AND VILLA ARCHITECTUKE. more than six inches on the side, as before mentioned. In France, wood which docs not exceed these dimensions sells at tlie same price as firewood. 768. Gont-houscs are not in use in Britain ; but in France the celebrated manufacturer, M. Ternaux, who introduced the Cachemire goat from Persia, keeps them in his grounds at St. Ouen, near Paris, in the same description of houses as he does his sheep. In similar houses deer might also be kept. 769. Rabbits may be kept in any dry house. Sometimes they are allowed to run at large on the floor, and a range of boxes, eighteen inches high, and two feet broad, is placed round it, at the foot of the walls, divided into compartments of two or three feet in length, with one small door, a foot high and six inches wide, to each. On other occasions, where there is a scarcity of room, or where rabbits are to be fed, they are kept in tiers of boxes, one above another, called hutches. Each box or hutch, in this case, has a grated front, and behind, or at one side, an inner box or division, for the animal to enter and rejjose. The size of this inner box may be a foot by eighteen inches, and eighteen inches high ; and the size of the open part of the box may be a cube of eighteen inches. The bars or spokes in front may be an inch square, and two inches apart. Two of them ought to take out, for the purpose of putting in food, &c. 770. Poidtri/-houses require no particular form or magnitude ; because, the animal being small in size, there is no necessity for accommodating the shape of the house to its par- ticular figure. Both terrestrial and aquatic poultry agree in requiring a di-y and rather warm lodging ; and they differ, in that the web-footed birds all roost on a flat surface, while gallinaceous fowls roost best at some height from the ground, on roundish horizontal rods or rails, of a size suitable for being grasped by their claws, but neither perfectly round nor perfectly smooth. All fowls, when in a state of incubation, require repose, to which darkness is favourable as well as solitude ; and places where they can have these requisites must be provided for them, as well as separate places for fattening them, to which also solitude and darkness are congenial. Poultry of every description, while growing, are exceedingly active, and, in an artificial state, require a considerable extent of yard to enable them to take sufficient exercise for health. The variety of their food is also con- siderable, including not only animal and vegetable matter, but even, as a help to digestion, salt, sand, or small pebbles. As land poultry require a dry yard, so aquatic poultry require ponds ; and, while the common hen will roost at the height of a few feet from the ground, the turkey and peacock prefer the highest trees. It must be evident from this variety in the nature of these animals, that every kind will require a separate house or compartment of a building, and that this house or compartment should be in four divisions ; one for rearing, another for keeping full-grown fowls, another for incubation, and a fourth for feeding. For the first two of these houses or divisions, a yard for the purpose of allowing the fowls to take exercise and pick up food is essential, and in this yard there ought always to be an open shed for shelter from the sun or rain, abundance of sand, and small pebbles ; and, for aquatic fowls, a large pond. The healthiest poultry of every description are those which are well fed in their yards in the morning, and allowed free exercise out of them the greater part of the day ; and the fattest poultry are those which are confined in the dark, and not allowed to take any exercise. In all cases where poultry have not the free use of a large yard, they should have troughs filled with sand and small pebbles, placed so as to allow them to pick them when they choose, to promote digestion. We have described, in the Encyclopccdia of Agriculture, the mode of fattening geese and other poultry, as practised at Strasburg ; but it is too disgusting to wish for its adoption in any other country. These being the general circumstances connected with domestic poultry for architectural purposes, they may be classed in the three fol- lowing divisions : viz., the web-footed or aquatic, which must necessarily, for every kind of treatment, be lodged on the ground floor ; the common cock and hen, which prefer the floor above ; and the turkey, guinea fowl, and peacock, which roost in lofty open sheds, or on trees. In small farms, therefore, all the different kinds of poultry may be lodged in the same house. Ducks and geese, with the other kinds, while rearing, on the ground floor ; common fowls, when full grown, and while in a state of incubation, on the middle floor ; and the turkey, &c., above. One yard may answer for the whole, provided it be sufficiently large, and contain a large pond. As warmth is highly conducive to the prosperity of poultry, common fowls are frequently lodged above cow-houses or stables, or even pigsties; and in other cases, when it is very desirable to cause hens to lay early in the season, their houses are heated by flues. When, however, the house is of a construction well calculated to retain heat, and it is perfectly dry below, and has few openings above, and a roof sufficiently thick to exclude all frost, artificial heat can very seldom be necessary. When it is desired to rear chickens ft)r sale very early in the season, the eggs may be hatched by hot water, or in a bed of tan, dung, leaves, or other fermenting matter ; and, after being hatched, they may be reared imder a roof of glass, which roof may be employed in the summer season as a covering for vines. At Bagshot Park,