169. No water, to _swim_ in, is necessary to the old, and is _injurious_ to the very young. They never should be suffered to swim (if water be near) till _more than a month old_. The old duck will lay, in the year, if _well kept_, ten dozen of eggs; and that is her best employment; for common hens are the best mothers. It is not good to let young ducks out in the morning to eat _slugs_ and _worms_; for, though they like them, these things kill them if they eat a great quantity. Grass, corn, white cabbages, and lettuces, and especially buck-wheat, cut, when half ripe, and flung down in the haulm. This makes fine ducks. Ducks will feed on garbage and all sorts of filthy things; but their flesh is _strong_, and bad in proportion. They are, in Long Island, fatted upon a coarse sort of _crab_, called a horse-foot fish, prodigious quantities of which are cast on the shores. The young ducks grow very fast upon this, and very fat; but wo unto him that has to _smell_ them when they come from the spit; and, as for _eating_ them, a man must have a stomach indeed to do that!
170. When young, they should be fed upon barley-meal, or _curds_, and kept in a warm place in the night-time, and not let out _early_ in the morning. They should, if possible, be kept from water to _swim_ in. It always does them harm; and, if intended to be sold to be killed _young_, they should never go near ponds, ditches, or streams. When you come to fat ducks, you must take care that they get at _no filth_ whatever. They will eat garbage of all sorts; they will suck down the most nauseous particles of all those substances which go for manure. A dead rat three parts rotten is a feast to them. For these reasons I should never eat any ducks, unless there were some mode of keeping them from this horrible food. I treat them precisely as I do my geese. I buy a troop when they are young, and put them in a pen, and feed them upon oats, cabbages, lettuces, and water, and have the place kept very clean. My ducks are, in consequence of this, a great deal more fine and delicate than any others that I know any-thing of.
171. These are _flying_ things, and so are _common fowls_. But it may happen that a few hints respecting them may be of use. To raise turkeys in this chilly climate, is a matter of much greater difficulty than in the climates that give great warmth. But the great enemy to young turkeys (for old ones are hardy enough) _is the wet_. This they will endure in _no climate_; and so true is this, that, in America, where there is always "_a wet spell_" in April, the farmers' wives take care never to have a brood come out until that spell is passed. In England, where the wet spells come at haphazard, the first thing is to take care that young turkeys never go out, on any account, except in dry weather, till the _dew be quite off the ground_; and this should be adhered to till they get to be of the size of an old partridge, and have their backs well covered with feathers. And, in wet weather, they should be kept under cover all day long.