Ducks may be kept at a trifling expense, and although it has been laid down as a sine qua non that to attempt to keep them without having a pond on the premises is absurd, we are able to assert from the experience of years that they will thrive and do well without one. A duck will eat almost anything and everything, and although a gourmand, is in no way fastidious as to the description of food. All refuse from the house, vegetables, green or otherwise, boiled with meal, and put into pans as often as they are empty, is all they require. They will fatten themselves. A place of shelter must be provided for them. One part of a fowl-house will answer the purpose well, separated from the other part with wire netting, so that the fowls may not have the opportunity of roosting over them. A little water will of course prove advantageous. We sank an old tub that had been used for scalding pigs in the ground, well puddled the outside with clay to render it water-tight, and in this miniature pond our ducks throve in a most astonishing manner. We were always very successful in rearing early ducks. Their price in early spring well repays any trouble or expense (in moderation) you may incur. Ducks will not bear confinement. They must be allowed to ramble about in the fields or in the garden.

They will do no mischief there, being very fond of slugs and snails. They do very much more good than one gives them credit for. Be careful there are no rat-holes near the place you have selected to keep your ducks, as, if there be rats on the premises, you will have but a very poor account of your ducklings. We lost the greater part of a brood in one night. The bedding most suited for ducks is straw, rushes, fern-leaves, or haybands opened out. This should be cleaned out every morning. One good drake will be perfectly content with from four to five ducks, as it is only since the civilization or domestication of the duck that he has become a monogamist, as in the wild state they pair and are most constant and attentive to each other, until the duck begins sitting, when the drake leaves the female and joins any other drake whose family affairs keep the duck closely occupied at home. Many people are in the habit of placing duck's eggs under a hen. For rearing early ducks this is a very good plan to adopt, as you more frequently find a hen wishing to sit early than a duck; but to insure early ducklings, a little care must be taken with them.

In a cow-house, if possible, have some pens or hutches nailed against the wall, just large enough to hold two or three ducklings, and let these be fed regularly several times a day, and in a few weeks they will be fit for market or table. They must be kept scrupulously clean, or they will be liable to cramps, and you will find their limbs distorted. In Buckinghamshire, famous for its breed of Aylesbury ducks, many cottages are in the early spring converted into breeding and rearing houses for early ducks on the plan above described. From nine to eleven eggs should be placed under the duck, according to its size. If a very large bird twelve or even fourteen may be placed under her. The nest should be comfortable, made of broken straw. As ducks will always cover their nests when they leave them, to hide the eggs, it is better to leave a little loose hay about that she may do so when quitting her nest to take her morning bath and her necessary food. When the ducklings are hatched they should not be allowed to go into the water too early, as having no feathers then, but merely down, they soon get saturated and drowned. When once they are fledged they cannot by any possibility become wet, as their oily feathers throw off the water. Ducks will travel a long distance in search of water.

They have been known to go upwards of a mile for it. It is well to ascertain before you allow them to frequent such ponds that there are no pike or eels there, as very often a fine duck will be carried off by the former, and young ones carried off by the latter. It is very interesting to watch them on their journey to and from the pond, following each other in single file like troops in a narrow defile. Do not be anxious about your ducks if they are absent all day; in the evening they will return full of food without any expense to their owner.

Ducks begin to lay generally in February, and the eggs should be taken away as soon as laid, leaving one always as a nest egg, which should be plainly marked. As soon as you see the duck inclined to sit, let them remain. A duck sits thirty days, and during that time it will require but little attention, except to see there is food at hand for the duck when she leaves her nest. It takes about three weeks to fatten the young ducks, or in fact any ducks. Leave plenty of food for them about; however coarse it may be matters not. If you have water near at hand on your own premises, so much the better. Their laying-places should then be placed as near the water as possible. Small wooden houses, divided in the middle with a door at each end. An old box makes a very good and inexpensive duck-house. Although water is the duck's natural element, when weak and young they should be placed under cover, as they are very liable to cramp before they are properly fledged.