HEN. See PHASIANUS, ORNITHOLOGY Index.
Guinea-Hen. See NUMIDA, ORNITHOLOGY Index.
Hen-Bane. See HYOSCIAMUS, BOTANY and MA-
TERA MEDICA Index.
Hen-Harrier. See FALCO, ORNITHOLOGY Index.
Hen-Mould Soil, in Agriculture, a term used by the
husbandmen in Northamptonshire, and other counties,
to express a black, hollow, spongy, and mouldering
earth, usually found at the bottoms of hills. It is an
earth much fitter for grazing than for corn, because it
will never settle close enough to the grain to keep it
sufficiently steady while it is growing up, without which,
the farmers observe, it either does not grow well; or,
if it seem to thrive, as it will in some years, the growth
is rank, and yields much straw, but little ear. It is too
moist, and to that is principally to be attributed this
rankness of the crop in some years; and the occasion of
its retaining so much moisture is, that it usually has a
bed of stiff clay, which will not let the water run off
into the under strata.
In some places they also give this name to a black,
rich, and dense earth, with streaks of a whitish mould
in many parts. This sort of hen-mould is usually found
very rich and fertile.