Note 34 — Chapter IV · THE TURKEY HISTORIC
Reading edition
Dixon, E. S. "Ornamental Poultry," 1818, p. 34. This author also noted the interesting fact that the female of the domesticated turkey sometimes has the tuft of hair on her breast like the male. Bechstein refers to the old German fable or superstition that a hen turkey lays as many eggs as the gobbler has feathers in the under tail-coverts, which, as we know, vary in number. (Naturgesch. Deutschlands, B iii, 1793, s. 309.).