uth Rocks, but they
were not the hen. Last winter I came upon the originator of the Buff
Plymouth Rocks--and here she was! I shall breed nothing henceforth but
Buff Plymouth Rocks.

In the Buff Rock we have a bird of ideal size, neither too large nor
too small, weighing about three pounds more than the undersized
Leghorn, and about three pounds less than the oversized Brahma; we have
a bird of ideal color, too--a single, soft, even tone, and no such
barnyard daub as the Rhode Island Red; not crow-colored, either, like
the Minorca; nor liable to all the dirt of the White Plymouth Rocks.
Being a beautiful and uniform buff, this perfect Plymouth Rock is
easily bred true to color, as the vari-colored fowls are not.

Moreover, the Buff Rock is a layer, is _the_ layer, maturing as she
does about four weeks later than the Rhode Island Reds, and so escaping
that fatal early fall laying with its attendant moult and eggless
interim until March! On the other hand, the Buff Rock matures about a
month earlier than the logy, slow-growing breeds, and so gets a good
start before the cold and eggless weather comes.

And such an egg! There are white eggs and brown eggs, large and small
eggs, but only one ideal egg--the Buff Rock's. It is of a soft lovely
brown, yet whitish enough for a New York market, but brown enough,
however, to meet the exquisite taste of the Boston trade. In fact it
is neither white nor brown, but rather a delicate blend of the two--a
new tone, indeed, a bloom rather, that I must call fresh-laid lavender.

So, at least, I am told. My pullets are not yet laying, having had a
very late start last spring. But the real question, speaking
professionally, with any breed of fowls is a market question: How do
they dress? How do they eat?

If the Buff Plymouth Rock is an ideal bird in her feathers, she is even
more so plucked. All white-feathered fowl, in spite of yellow legs,
look cadaverous when picked. All dark-feathered fowl, with their
tendency to green legs and black pin-feathers, look spotted, long dead,
and unsavory. But the Buff Rock, a melody in color, shows that
consonance, that consentaneousness, of flesh to feather that makes the
plucked fowl to the feathered fowl what high noon is to the faint and
far-off dawn--a glow of golden legs and golden neck, mellow, melting as
butter, and all the more so with every unpicked pinfeather.

Can there be any doubt of the existence of hen-perfection? Any
q