formed, crossing would come into play in changing their character and in increasing their number. Brahma Pootras, according to an account lately published in America, offer a good instance of a breed, lately formed by a cross, which can be truly propagated. The well-known Sebright Bantams offer another and similar instance. Hence it may be concluded that not only the Game-breed but that all our breeds are probably the descendants of the {246} Malayan or Indian variety of _G. bankiva_. If so, this species has varied greatly since it was first domesticated; but there has been ample time, as we shall now show. _History of the Fowl._--Rütimeyer found no remains of the fowl in the ancient Swiss lake-dwellings. It is not mentioned in the Old Testament; nor is it figured on the ancient Egyptian monuments.[393] It is not referred to by Homer or Hesiod (about 900 B.C.); but is mentioned by Theognis and Aristophanes between 400 and 500 B.C. It is figured on some of the Babylonian cylinders, of which Mr. Layard sent me an impression, between the sixth and seventh centuries B.C.; and on the Harpy Tomb in Lycia, about 600 B.C.: so that we may feel pretty confident that the fowl reached Europe somewhere near the sixth century B.C. It had travelled still farther westward by the time of the Christian era, for it was found in Britain by Julius Cæsar. In India it must have been domesticated when the Institutes of Manu were written, that is, according to Sir W. Jones, 1200 B.C., but, according to the later authority of Mr. H. Wilson, only 800 B.C., for the domestic fowl is forbidden, whilst the wild is permitted to be eaten. If, as before remarked, we may trust the old Chinese Encyclopædia, the fowl must have been domesticated several centuries earlier, as it is said to have been introduced from the West into China 1400 B.C.