But the most interesting birds on the place were not wild, being nothing more nor less than ordinary fowls engaged in what to me were most unordinary occupations. Parker had several hundred fowls, and had by trial discovered the truth of the statement that capons make far better mothers than do hens, especially for very young chicks. We saw dozens of broods of chickens, and one or two of young guinea-fowl, being taken care of by caponized bantams, game-cocks, and cochin-chinas. These improvised mothers looked almost precisely as they did before being caponized, the differences, chiefly in the color of the comb, being insignificant, for they were full-grown birds when operated on. But their natures had suffered the most extraordinary change, for they had developed not only the habits but the voices of unusually exemplary mother hens. They never crowed; they clucked precisely like hens; and they protected, covered, fed, and led about their broods just like hens. They were timid, except in defense of the chicks; but on their behalf they were really formidable fighters. The change in habits takes place with extraordinary rapidity. In a few hours the cock has completely changed and can be placed with a brood which he promptly adopts. In perhaps one case in ten he does not take readily to his duties as an _ex-officio_ hen; and in such case the further measure adopted seems as incredible as the rest of the performance, for he is made drunk with whiskey, acts as if he were intoxicated, and then promptly develops maternal feelings, and zealously enters on his new career.
We saw game-cocks clucking and calling to their broods of little chicks, to get them to the crumbs we tossed to them, and then sitting with the chicks not only under their wings but on their backs. They kept the broods with them until the young were nearly as large as they were; in one case the brood consisted of guinea-fowl. Moreover, they welcomed any brood, no matter how large. One big rooster was leading around so many chickens--all, by what seemed a sardonic jest, his own progeny, the progeny of the days when he was a mere unregenerate father--that when they took shelter under him he had to spread his wings; "like a buzzard," said my host, to whom soaring buzzards were familiar sights. Of course, the extraordinary part of all this was not the loss of the male qualities but the immediate and complete acquirement of those of the female. It was as if steers invariably took to mothering calves, or geldings to adopting foals.