=Color in feathers.= While colors in the plumage are distributed very differently in different species of birds, often making combinations peculiar to a species, there is in all the same wonderful formation of patterns, that depends for its effect in a section upon some overlapping feathers being marked alike and others having a different marking; and for the effect in a single feather, upon adjacent barbs being now alike, now different, in the distribution of the pigment in them. The best common example of a pattern covering a series of feathers is found on the wing of a Mallard Duck or of a Rouen Duck. Interesting examples of the formation of patterns on a single feather may be found in the plumage of barred, laced, and penciled fowls, and also in the lacings on the body feathers of the females of the varieties of ducks mentioned. Perhaps the most interesting illustrations of this kind, however, are to be seen on the plain feathers of the guinea and the gorgeous tail of the peacock. The pigment which colors the plumage may be found in soluble form in the quills of immature colored feathers. It is not conspicuous unless it is quite dark. In black fowls it is often so abundant that a part remains in the skin when the feathers are removed. After the pigment is deposited in the web of the feather the color is fast. Water does not affect it, but it fades a little with age and exposure. New plumage usually contains a great deal of oil, a condition which is most conspicuous in white birds, to whose plumage the oil gives a creamy tint. In colored birds the presence of a large amount of oil in feathers is desirable because it gives greater brilliance to the plumage. [Illustration: Fig. 2. White Leghorn chicks (ten days old)] =Growth and molting of feathers.= The first covering of a young bird is down. The young of birds which nest on the ground have the down covering when hatched; others acquire it in a few days. In small land birds which feather quickly, as Leghorn and Hamburg chicks, the largest wing feathers may have started to grow before the chick leaves the egg. In most kinds of poultry, however, the young show no signs of feathers for some days. The down is gradually replaced by small feathers, and these by larger feathers as the bird grows. As feathers in all stages of growth are found on the young bird at the same time, it is not known whether all feathers are molted the same number of times. In cases where some feathers were marked and watched, or where the colors changed with the changing feathers, it appeared that after the down three sets of feathers were grown in succession, the third and last making the adult plumage of the bird. This coat remains until the following summer or fall, when it is molted and replaced by a new one.