The History of the Hen Fever. A Humorous Record

The History of the Hen Fever. A Humorous Record
George Burnham

George P. Burnham

The History of the Hen Fever. A Humorous Record

PREFACE

In preparing the following pages, I have had the opportunity to inform myself pretty accurately regarding the ramifications of the subject upon which I have written herein; and I have endeavored to avoid setting down "aught in malice" in this "History of the Hen Fever" in the United States.

I have followed this extraordinary mania from its incipient stages to its final death, or its cure, as the reader may elect to term its conclusion. The first symptoms of the fever were exhibited in my own house at Roxbury, Mass., early in the summer of 1849. From that time down to the opening of 1855 (or rather to the winter of 1854), I have been rather intimately connected with the movement, if common report speaks correctly; and I believe I have seen as much of the tricks of this trade as one usually meets with in the course of a single natural life.

Now that the most serious effects of this (for six years) alarming epidemic have passed away from among us, and when "the people" who have been called upon to pay the cost of its support, and for the burial of its victims, can look back upon the scenes that have in that period transpired with a disposition cooled by experience, I have thought that a volume like this might prove acceptable to the hundreds and thousands of those who once "took an interest in the hen trade," – who may have been mortally wounded, or haply who have escaped with only a broken wing; and who will not object to learn how the thing has been done, and "who threw the bricks"!

If my readers shall be edified and amused with the perusal of this work as much as I have been in recalling these past scenes while writing it, I am content that I have not thrown the powder away. I have written it in perfect good-nature, with the design to gratify its readers, and to offend no man living.

And trusting that all will be pleased who may devote an hour to its pages, while at the same time I indulge the hope that none will feel aggrieved by its tone, or its text, I submit this book to the public.

Respectfully,

    Geo. P. Burnham.

Russet House, Melrose, 1855.

CHAPTER I.

PREMONITORY SYMPTOMS OF THE DISEASE

I was sitting, one afternoon, in the summer of 1849, in my little parlor, at Roxbury, conversing with a friend, leisurely, when he suddenly rose, and passing to the rear window of the room, remarked to me, with considerable enthusiasm,

"What a splendid lot of fowls you have, B – ! Upon my word, those are very fine indeed, – do you know it?"

I had then been breeding poultry (for my own amusement) many years; and the specimens I chanced at that time to possess were rather even in color, and of good size; but were only such as any one might have had – bred from the common stock of the country – who had taken the same pains that I did with mine.

There were perhaps a dozen birds, at the time, in the rear yard, and my friend (then, but who subsequently passed to a competitor, and eventually turned into a sharp but harmless enemy) was greatly delighted with them, as I saw from his enthusiastic conversation, and his laudation of their merits.

I am not very fast, perhaps, to appreciate the drift of a man's motives in casual conversation, – and then, again, it may be that I am "not so slow" to comprehend certain matters as I might be! At all events, I have sometimes flattered myself that, on occasions like this, I can "see as far into a millstone as can he who picks it;" and so I listened to my friend, heard all he had to say, and made up my mind accordingly, before he left me.

"I tell you, B – , those are handsome chickens," he insisted. "I've got a fine lot, myself. You keep but one variety, I notice. I've got 'em all."

"All what?" I inquired.

"O, all kinds – all kinds. The Chinese, and the Malays, and the Gypsies, and the Chittaprats, and the Wang Hongs, and the Yankee Games, and Bengallers, and Cropple-crowns, and Creepers, and Top-knots, and Gold Pheasants, and Buff Dorkings, and English Games, and Black Spanish and Bantams, – and I've several new breeds too, I have made myself, by crossing and mixing, in the last year, which beat the world for beauty and size, and excellence of quality."

"Indeed!" I exclaimed. "So you have made several new breeds during one year's crossing, eh? That is remarkable, doctor, certainly. I have never been able yet to accomplish so extraordinary a feat, myself," I added.

"Well, I have," said the doctor, – and probably, as he was a practising physician of several years' experience, he knew how this reversion of nature's law could be accomplished. I didn't.

"Yes," he continued; "I have made a breed I call the 'Plymouth Rocks,' – superb birds, and great layers. The – a – 'Yankee Games,' – regular knock-'em-downs, – rather fight than eat, any time; and never flinch from the puncture of steel. Indeed, so plucky are these fowls, that I think they rather like to be cut up than otherwise, – alive, I mean. Then, I've another breed I've made – the 'Bengal Mountain Games.' These are smashers – never yield, and are magnificent in color. Then I have the 'Fawn-colored Dorkings,' too; and several other fancy breeds, that I've fixed up; and fancy poultry is going to sell well in the next three years, you may be sure. Come and see my stock, B – , won't you? And I'll send you anything you want from it, with pleasure."

I was then the editor of a weekly paper in Boston. I accepted my friend's kind invitation, and travelled forty miles and back to examine his poultry. It looked well —very well; the arrangement of his houses, &c., was good, and I was gratified with the show of stock, and with his politeness. But he was an enthusiast; and I saw this at the outset. And though I heard all he had to say, I could not, for the life of me, comprehend how it was that he could have decided upon the astounding merits of all these different breeds of fowls in so short a space of time – to wit, by the crossings in a single year! But that was his affair, not mine. He was getting his fancy poultry ready for the market; and he repeated, "It will sell, by and by."

And I believe it did, too! The doctor was right in this particular.

He informed me that he intended to exhibit several specimens of his fowls, shortly, in Boston; and soon afterwards I met with an advertisement in one of the agricultural weeklies, signed by my friend the doctor, the substance of which was as follows:

Notice. – I will exhibit, at Quincy Market, Boston, in a few days, sample pairs of my fowls, of the following pure breeds; namely, Cochin-China, Yellow Shanghae, Black Spanish, Fawn-colored Dorkings, Plymouth Rocks, White Dorkings, Wild Indian, Malays, Golden Hamburgs, Black Polands, Games, &c. &c; and I shall be happy to see the stock of other fanciers, at the above place, to compare notes, etc. etc.

The above was the substance of the "notice" referred to; and the doctor, coming to Boston shortly after, called upon me. I showed him the impropriety of this movement at once, and suggested that some spot other than Quincy Market should be chosen for the proposed exhibition, – in which I would join, provided an appropriate place should be selected.

After talking the matter over again, application was made to an agricultural warehouse in Ann-street, or Blackstone-street, I believe; the keepers of which saw the advantages that must accrue to themselves by such a show (which would necessarily draw together a great many strangers, out of whom they might subsequently make customers); but, at my suggestion, this very stupid plan was abandoned – even after the advertisements were circulated that such an exhibition would come off there.

Upon final consideration it was determined that the first Exhibition of Fancy Poultry in the United States of America should take place in November, 1849, at the Public Garden, Boston.

CHAPTER II.

THE "COCHIN-CHINAS." BUBBLE NUMBER ONE

A public meeting was soon called at the legislative hall of the Statehouse, in Boston, which had the effect of drawing together a very goodly company of savans, honest farmers, amateurs, poulterers, doctors, lawyers, flats, fanciers and humbugs of one kind or another. I never attended one of the meetings; and only know, from subsequent public and private "reports," what occurred there.

On this first occasion, however, after a great deal of bosh and stuff, from the lips of old men and young men, who possessed not the slightest possible shadow of practical knowledge of the subject proposed to be discussed, it was finally resolved that the name for the (now defunct) association then and there formed, should be "The New England Society for the Improvement of Domestic Poultry"!!!

Now, the only objection I ever raised to this title was that it was not sufficiently lengthy! When applied to for my own views on the subject, I recommended that it should be called the "Mutual Admiration Society." But, though I was thought a great deal of by its members, – especially when the concern was short of funds, – in this case they thought my proposed title was altogether too applicable; and the original name, above quoted, was adhered to.

I was honored with the office of vice-president of the society, for Massachusetts; to which place I was reëlected annually, I believe, until the period of its death. For which honor I was not ungrateful, and in consideration of which, "as in duty bound, I have ever prayed" for the association's prosperity and weal.

The first name that was placed upon the list of subscribers to the constitution of this society was that of His Excellency Geo. N. Briggs, formerly Governor of this commonwealth. He was followed by a long list of "mourners," most of whom probably ascertained, within five years from the hour when they subscribed to this roll, that causing the cock's spur to grow between his eyes was not quite so easy a thing to accomplish as one "experienced poultry-breeder" at this meeting coolly asserted it to be! How many attempted this experiment (as well as numerous others there suggested as feasible), I am not advised. But I am inclined to think that those who did try it found it to be "all in their eye."

While these gentlemen were arranging the details of the new "society," and were deciding upon what the duties of the officers and committees should be, I quietly wrote out to England for information regarding the somewhat notorious "Cochin-China" fowl, then creating considerable stir among fanciers in Great Britain; and soon learned that I could procure them, in their purity, from a gentleman in Dublin, whose stock had been obtained, through Lord Heytsbury (then Lord Lieutenant of Ireland), direct from Queen Victoria's samples. I ordered six of them, – two cocks and four hens, – and in December, 1849, I received them through Adams & Co.'s Transatlantic Express.

At this period there was no telegraph established from Boston to Halifax, I believe. Some of the reporters for the daily city papers usually visited the steamers, upon their arrival here, to obtain their foreign files of exchanges; and here my birds were first seen by those gentlemen who have made or broken the prospects of more than one enterprise of far greater consequence than this "importation of fancy fowls" could seem to be.

But on the day succeeding the coming of those birds, several very handsome notices of the arrival of these august Chinamen appeared in the Boston papers, and a vast amount of credit was accorded to the "enterprising importer" of the outlandish brutes, that were described in almost celestial language!

After considerable trouble and swearing (custom-house swearing, I mean), the officers on board permitted my team to take the cage out of the steamer, and it was conveyed to my residence in Roxbury, where it arrived two hours after dark.

I had long been looking for the coming of these Celestial strangers, and the "fever," which I had originally taken in a very kindly way, had by this time affected me rather seriously. I imagined I had a fortune on board that steamer. I looked forward with excited ideas to beholding something that this part of the world had never yet seen, and which would surely astound "the people," when I could have the opportunity to show up my rare prize, – all the way from the yards or walks of royalty itself! I waited and watched, with anxious solicitude, – and, at last, the box arrived at my house. It was a curiously-built box – the fashion of it was unique, and substantial, and foreign in its exterior. I supposed, naturally, that its contents must be similar in character. That box contained my "Cochin-Chinas," – bred from the Queen's stock, – about which, for many weeks, I had been so seriously disturbed.

I am now well satisfied that the "Cochin-China" variety of fowl is a gross fable. If such a breed exist, in reality, we have never had them in this country. Anything (and everything) has been called by this name among us, in the last five years; but the engraving on the following page, in my estimation (and I have been there!), is the nearest thing possible to a likeness of this long petted bird; and will be recognized, I think, by more than one victim, as an accurate and faithful portrait of this lauded "magnificent" and "superb" bird!

I was anxious to examine my celestial friends at once. I caused the box to be taken into a shed, at the rear of the house, and I tore from its front a piece of canvas that concealed them from view, to behold a – well! n'importe– they were Cochin-China fowls!

But, since God made me, I never beheld six such birds before, or since! They resembled giraffes much more nearly than they did any other thing, carnivorous, omnivorous, – fish, flesh, or fowl. I let them out upon the floor, and one of the cocks seized lustily upon my India-rubber over-shoe, and would have swallowed it (and myself), for aught I know, had not a friend who stood by seized him, and absolutely choked him off!

This is truth, strange as it may seem; but I presume they had scarcely been fed at all upon their fortnight's voyage from Dublin, and I never saw any animals so miserably low in flesh, in my life, before. What with their long necks, and longer legs, and their wretchedly starved condition, I never wondered that the friendly reporters spoke of their appearance as being "extraordinary, and strikingly peculiar."

These were the original "Cochin-China" fowls of America. And they probably never had the first drop of Chinese blood in their veins, any more than had the man who bred them, and who knew this fact much better than I did – who knew it well enough.

I housed my "prize" forthwith, however, and provided them with everything for their convenience and comfort. The six fowls cost me ninety dollars. They were beauties, to be sure! When I informed a neighbor of their cost, he ventured upon the expressive rejoinder that I "was a bigger d – d fool than he had ever taken me for."