The History of the Hen Fever. A Humorous Record

To which I responded nothing, for I rather agreed with him myself!

Nine months afterwards, however, I sold him a cock and three pullets, four months old, raised from those very fowls, for sixty-five dollars; and I didn't retort upon him even then, but took his money. The chickens I sold him were "dog-cheap," at that!

CHAPTER III.

THE FIRST FOWL-SHOW IN BOSTON

Never in the history of modern "bubbles," probably, did any mania exceed in ridiculousness or ludicrousness, or in the number of its victims surpass this inexplicable humbug, the "hen fever."

Kings and queens and nobility, senators and governors, mayors and councilmen, ministers, doctors and lawyers, merchants and tradesmen, the aristocrat and the humble, farmers and mechanics, gentlemen and commoners, old men and young men, women and children, rich and poor, white, black and grey, —everybody was more or less seriously affected by this curious epidemic.

The press of the country, far and near, was alive with accounts of "extraordinary pullets," "enormous eggs" (laid on the tables of the editors), "astounding prices" obtained for individual specimens of rare poultry; and all sorts of people, of every trade and profession and calling in life, were on the qui vive, and joined in the hue-and-cry, regarding the suddenly and newly ascertained fact that hens laid eggs —sometimes; or, that somebody's crower was heavier, larger, or higher on the legs (and consequently higher in value), than somebody else's crower. And the first exhibition of the society with the long name came off duly, at last, as agreed upon by the people, and myself.

"The people"! By this term is ordinarily meant the body-politic, the multitude, the citizens at large, the voters, the – the – a – the masses; the – well, no matter! At the period of which I am now writing, the term signified the "hen-men." This covered the whole ground, at that time. Everybody was included, and thus nobody was left outside!

At this first show, the committee "flattered themselves" (and who ever heard of, or from, a committee that didn't do this!) that never, within the memory of the oldest inhabitant, – who, by the way, was then living, but has since departed to that bourn from which even defunct hen-men do not return, – never had such a display been witnessed; never had the feathered race before appeared in such pristine beauty; never had any such exhibition been seen or read of, since the world begun! And, to say truth, it wasn't a very bad sight, – that same first hen-show in Boston.

Thousands upon thousands visited it, the newspapers appropriated column after column to its laudation, and all sorts of people flocked to the Public Garden to behold the "rare and curious and inexpressibly-beautiful samples" of poultry caged up there, every individual specimen of which had, up to that hour, been straggling and starving in the yards of "the people" about Boston (they and their progeny) for years and years before, unknown, unhonored and unsung.

Gilded complimentary cards, in beautifully-embossed envelopes, were duly forwarded by the "committee" to all "our first men," who came on foot or in carriages, with their lovely wives and pretty children, to see the extraordinary sight. The city fathers, the public functionaries, governors, senators, representatives, all responded to the invitation, and everybody was there.

The cocks crowed lustily, the hens cackled musically, the ducks quacked sweetly, the geese hissed beautifully, the chickens peeped delightfully, the gentlemen talked gravely, the ladies smiled beneficently, the children laughed joyfully, the uninitiated gaped marvellously, the crowd conversed wisely, the few knowing ones chuckled quietly, – everybody enjoyed the thing immensely, – and suddenly, prominent among the throng of admirers present, loomed up the stalwart form and noble head of Daniel Webster, who came, like the rest, to see what he had only "read of" for the six months previously.

The committee saw him, and they instantly lighted on him for a speech; but he declined.

"Only a few words!" prayed one of them.

"One word, one word!" insisted the chairman.

"I can't!" said Daniel.

But they were importunate and unyielding, that enthusiastic committee.

"Gentlemen!" said the honorable senator, at last, amid the din. "Ladies and gentlemen!" he continued, as a monster upon feathered stilts, at his elbow, shrieked out an unearthly crow, that drowned the sound of his voice instanter, – "Ladies and gentlemen, really – I – would – but the noise and confusion is so great, that I cannot be heard!" – and a roar followed this capital hit, that drowned, for the moment, at least, even the rattling, crashing, bellowing, squeaking music of the feathered bipeds around him.

The exhibition lasted three days. Unheard-of prices were asked, and readily paid, for all sorts of fowls; most of those sold being mongrels, however. As high as thirteen dollars was paid by one man (who soon afterwards became an inmate of a lunatic asylum) for a single pair of domestic fowls. It was monstrous, ridiculous, outrageous, exclaimed every one, when this fact – the absolute paying down of thirteen round dollars, then the price of two barrels of good wheat flour – was announced as having been squandered for a single pair of chickens.

I sold some fowls at that show. I didn't buy any there, I believe.

The receipts at the gates paid the expenses of the exhibition, and left a small surplus in the hands of somebody, – I never knew who, – but who took good care of the money, I have not a doubt; as most of the officers at that time were, like myself, "poor, but honest."

By the time this fair closed, the pulse of the "dear people" had come to be rather rapid in its throbs, and the fever was evidently on the increase. Fowls were in demand. Not good ones, because nothing was then said by the anxious would-be purchasers about quality. Nobody had got so far as that, then. They wanted fowls only, – hens and cocks, – to which they themselves gave a name.

Some fancied one breed, or variety, and some another; but anything that sported feathers, – from the diminutive Bantam to the stork-shaped Chinaman, – everything was being sought after by "amateurs" and "fanciers" with a zest, and a readiness to pay for, that did honor to the zeal of the youthful buyers, and a world of good to the hearts of the quiet breeders and sellers, who began first to get posted up, and inured to the disease.

I was an humble and modest member of this latter class. I kept and raised only pure breeds of fowls.

CHAPTER IV.

HOW "POULTRY-BOOKS" ARE MADE

Soon after this, I learned that one Asa Rugg, of Pennsylvania (a nom de guerre), was in the possession of a breed of fowls that challenged all comparison for size and weight. They were called the Chittagong fowl, and were thus described in the poultry-books published in 1850:

"The fowl thus alluded to has been imported, within the last two or three years, into Pennsylvania, and ranks at the head of the list, in that region, for all the good qualities desirable in a domestic bird. The color is a streaked grey, rather than otherwise, and the portraits below" (my birds) "are fine samples of this great stock. They are designated as the Grey Chittagongs."

"Asa Rugg," in his letter to me, described this stock as being at the head of the races of poultry, having "the largest blood in them of any variety of fowl with which he was acquainted." The pair he first sent me were light-grey and streaked, and "at less than seven months old weighed over nineteen pounds."

He said, in that insinuating and delicate manner so peculiar to the habits of gentlemen who possess what another wishes to buy of them, – "I did not intend, my dear Mr. B – , to part with these magnificent specimens at any figure whatever. I assure you I had much rather retain them; for they are very fine, as you would say, could you see them. If, however, you are disposed to pay my price, I shall let you have them. I really shall regret their absence from my yard, however. Try and make up your mind to be satisfied with something else – won't you? These fowls I must keep, if possible," &c. &c.

Now, Asa knew very well, if he had charged me two hundred (instead of twenty) dollars for those grey fowls, I should have taken them from him. Of course I sent for them at once; and, within ten days, they were in my poultry-house, a new wonder for the hundreds who called to see my "superb" and "extraordinary" fowls.

A competitor turned up, a few months after this, a notorious breeder in P – , who, though a respectable man, otherwise, never knew a hen from a stove-pipe, but who had more money at that time than I had, and who, in the hen-trade, possessed the impudence of the devil, without the accompanying graces to carry out his object.

This man chanced, while in Pennsylvania, to hear Asa speak of me, and at once he stepped in to "head me" in that quarter. He bought all the "Grey Chittagongs" that Rugg had left (most of which, when they reached P – , happened to be dark red and brown), and forthwith set up an establishment in opposition to me; for what purpose I never knew. I did not know him from a side of sole-leather, I had never spoken to or of him, and I could not comprehend why this person should render himself, as he did, my future "death's head" in the fowl-trade.

If he went into the traffic for the purpose of making money out of it, he has found, by this time, I have no doubt, that he would have been, at the very least calculation, five thousand dollars better off had he never thrust himself into a business of which he did not know the first rudiments.

If he embarked in it to interfere with or to injure me, personally, he has now ascertained, I imagine, that it required a faster horse than he was in the habit of driving to keep in sight of my team.

If his purpose was the gratification of his own petty spite or ambition only, he has had to pay for the enjoyment of it, – ay, to his dear cost! – and he is welcome to all he ever made out of his contemptible, niggardly huckstering.

Soon after the first exhibition, it was announced by the publishers in Boston that Dr. Bennett's new Treatise would be immediately issued by them. The doctor had originally applied to the establishment in which I was then a partner, to issue this work; but I recommended him to the others, because our own facilities for getting it out were not so good as I thought were theirs.

I furnished a considerable amount of the matter for that book, and had already obtained, at my own individual expense, several of the engravings which appear in the work spoken of. After the original cuts were placed in the publishers' hands, they were reduced in size, and injured (for my purposes), as I conceived, when they finally appeared in print.

The doctor's book on poultry had been announced again and again; but it did not make its appearance in the market, in consequence of his tardiness. Week after week, and month after month, passed by, but still no Dr. Bennett's book could be found. I saw some of the proof-sheets finally, observed the fate of the illustrations of my fowls, and made up my mind what I would do. The book was at last announced positively to appear in three weeks.

I immediately called at a stereotype foundery, and asked how much time it would require to stereotype a work of one hundred and fifty pages for me. I was told that it would occupy three to four weeks to complete it. "Can't it be done in one week?" I inquired. The proprietor smiled, and said that this was impossible. I replied, "Well, sir, to-day is Tuesday. I have engaged to deliver in New York city, on the morning of a week from next Saturday, three thousand copies of a book which I am about to write. Is there no way that you can help me out?" The gentleman looked at me incredulously.

I added, "Mr. – , I have been in the newspaper business a good many years, and I have had the message of the President of the United States – a document occupying a dozen columns of solid brevier and minion – set up and put to press within forty-two minutes from the time it reached our office. Anything can be accomplished, now-a-days, if we but will it."

"But, you say you are about to write it. When will the 'copy' be ready?" said the stereotyper.

"I have thought of this," I replied, "but a few hours. The title, even, is not yet decided upon. I will give you fifty pages of manuscript to-morrow morning, the next day I will add another fifty, and you shall have the whole in hand by Friday morning."

He kindly undertook to aid me. I engaged three engravers, who worked day and night upon the drawings and transfers of the fowls for my illustrations; the paper was wet down on Monday and Tuesday; I read the final revised proof of my work on Wednesday night; the book went to press on Thursday; the binders were ready for it as it came up, the covers were put on on Friday morning, and I sent to the New York house (who had bespoken them), by Harnden's Express, on Friday evening, three thousand five hundred copies of the "New England Poultry-Breeder," illustrated with twenty-five correct engravings of my choice, magnificent, superb, unapproachable, pure-bred fowls.

This book had an extraordinary sale, – far beyond my own calculations, certainly. I got it out for the purpose of "doing justice" to my own stock, and calculated that it would prove a good advertising medium for me, – which it did, by the way. But the demand for the "New England Poultry-Breeder" was immense. And thirteen different editions (varying from three thousand five hundred to one thousand copies each) were issued within as many weeks, and were sold, every copy of them. This is the true history of the "New England Poultry-Breeder."

By and by Dr. Bennett's book appeared. The market was now glutted with this kind of thing, and this work, though a good one, generally, dragged on the hands of its originators. I doubt if a thousand copies of this book ever found their way into the market, the author being too deeply engrossed with his then thriving trade, to trouble himself about urging the sale of his book, or of thinking about the interests of his publishers.

CHAPTER V.

THREATENING INDICATIONS

Another meeting was now called at the Statehouse, which was even more fully attended than the first, and at which much more serious indications of enthusiasm were apparent.

Old men, and middle-aged farmers, and florists, and agriculturists, and live-stock breeders, from all parts of this and the neighboring states, congregated together on this eventful occasion, and entered into the debate with an earnestness worthy of so important and "glorious" a cause.