Would the world not be a better place if everybody kept free range chickens - useful and ornamental as they are? To the objection that this is not possible the way the world is currently organised (i.e. with folks living in congested urban agglomerations, in high rises etc etc) one could respond by suggesting that the current arrangements leave much to be desired - with a great deal of land in the hands of a few who do not manage it as productively and (dare one say it?) as lovingly as it might otherwise be managed.

Be that as it may, one would be surprised to learn that many, or indeed any, of those who have initiated conflict, mayhem and mischief in the history of the world were prominent in the ranks of chicken keepers. Those territories just don't seem to go together.

My favourite 18th century lady - second only to Smollett's Winifred Jenkins (who is admittedly fictional, and no lady) is Mrs Thrale, who upset Dr Johnson, after the death of her brewer husband, Mr T., by marrying her daughters' Italian music teacher, Gabriel Piozzi. She spent much of her life in London, but built an elegant house at Tremeirchion, on the escarpment overlooking the vale of Clwyd. The house, called Brynbella (bella as in Italian, not Welsh) still stands, and may be viewed from the road that skirts the parkland.

Not only did Mrs T. like Wales and the Welsh (partly because they so closely resembled Italian country folk), she also kept chickens, and had interesting things to say about them. As follows:

"I had a black and white speckled Hen once changed entirely white at the moulting Season; She seemed very ill and drooping before the Change, and after her Plumage was milk white, & She was recovered her Illness, She used to hide herself among the Bushes as if ashamed of the alteration, which had indeed a very particular Effect. This Accident, joyn’d to some Observation inclines me to think whiteness rather an Imperfection wherever it is found… and indeed - to look no further, our own Hair grows white as we all know merely from Age, Grief, Sickness, Fright or some evil Accident befalling us: it is further observable that in the Torrid Zone there are few if any white Animals, in the Temperate Zone whiteness seems to be always an Effect of Decay - and in the Frigid Zone the Foxes, the Bears, the Deer - every thing is white: go still further - Human Creatures - which are black under the Line, get fairer in more temperate Latitudes, and the Scotch Highlanders we all know to be eminently white of Complexion - Horse as well as Men and Dogs grow grey with Age, but if they are naturally white or Cream Colour - does anybody think well of them? did ever white Horse win a Plate? or ever white Cock gain a Battle? - Newmarket is conscious of the contrary. in Vegetable Substances - has a white Rose the same Degree of fragrance as a Red? and in Minerals is not Silver less precious than Gold? To return to Animals are not People with white Hair and Eye brows reckoned foolish, and in effect did one ever hear of a great Man who was eminently white? are not Children fairest while they are Infants? - and does not the Complexion gain Colour as the Body & Mind gains Strength? - so much for my hypothesis concerning Whiteness, which Linnaeus carries still farther when holds the original Human Pair to have Been Black, and the Europeans to be only an accidental Variety."

The above from Thraliana, ed. K. Balderston. Entry dated 1777. BTW I'm looking for a copy of Thraliana, preferably under £70. Reading copy will do.