The History of the Hen Fever. A Humorous Record

    Daniel Webster.

From Hon. Col. Phipps, H.R.M. Secretary

    Windsor Castle, Eng., 1853.

Dear Sir:

The cage of Grey Shanghae fowls intended as a present from you to Her Majesty the Queen has this day been received from Mr. Mitchell, of the Zoological Gardens, and they have been highly admired by Her Majesty.

I have received Her Majesty's commands to assure Mr. Burnham of her high appreciation of his attention; and to add that it affords another addition to the many marks of good will from the citizens of the United States which the Queen has received, and to which Her Majesty attaches so high a value.

I have the honor to be

    Your ob't and humble ser't,
    C.B. Phipps.

Similar documents were often received by me, from friends and customers who knew how to appreciate good stock; and I have now hundreds of letters on file, of the most flattering character, – from every State in the Union, from England, Ireland, France, Bavaria, etc., where my stock was sent, and was roundly paid for, – all of which letters (with their enclosures, from time to time) served amply to "balance accounts" against the few received of an opposite character, and aided materially, also, to keep "the subscriber" from caving in!

Among the most friendly customers I ever had, and those who bought the most liberally, – while they were the most kindly in all their intercourse with me, – I must mention my patrons of the South generally, but especially the buyers in New Orleans and its vicinity. I never met with a trickster amongst them, and they paid me thousands upon thousands of dollars, without a word of cavil or complaint, from first to last. These fanciers had long purses, and are live men, with hearts "as big as a barn," so far as my experience goes.

CHAPTER XIV.

"BOTHER'EM POOTRUMS." BUBBLE NUMBER TWO

There was something tangible, and real, in the "Cochin-China" fowl, – something that could be seen and realized (precious little, to be sure!), but still there was something. The Cochin-China hens would lay eggs (occasionally), and when they didn't breed their chickens with feathers upon the legs, they came without them. If the legs were not black or green skinned, they were either yellow or some other color. Their plumage was either spotted and speckled, or it wasn't. And thus the true article, the pure-bred Cochins, could always be designated and identified, – by the knowing ones, – I presume. I studied them pretty carefully, however, for five years; but I never knew what a "Cochin-China" fowl really was, yet!

But when, in 1850 and '51, the "Bother'ems" begun to be brought into notice, I saw at once that, although this was bubble number two, it ought to have been number one, decidedly.

Never was a grosser hum promulgated than this was, from beginning to end, even in the notorious hum of the hen-trade. There was absolutely nothing whatever in it, about it, or connected with it, that possessed the first shade of substance to recommend it, saving its name. And this could not have saved it, but from the fact that nobody (not even the originator of the unpronounceable cognomen himself) was ever able to write or spell it twice in the same manner.

The variety of fowl itself was the Grey Chittagong, to which allusion has already been made, and the first samples of which I obtained from "Asa Rugg" (Dr. Kerr), of Philadelphia, in 1850. Of this no one now entertains a doubt. They were the identical fowl, all over, – size, plumage and characteristics.

But my friend the Doctor wanted to put forth something that would take better than his "Plymouth Rocks;" and so he consulted me as to a name for a brace of grey fowls I saw in his yard. I always objected to the multiplying of titles; but he insisted, and finally entered them at our Fitchburg Dépôt Show as "Burrampooters," all the way from India.

These three fowls were bred from Asa Rugg's Grey Chittagong cock, with a yellow Shanghae hen, in Plymouth, Mass. They were an evident cross, all three of them having a top-knot! But, n'importe. They were then "Burrampooters."

Subsequently, these fowls came to be called "Buram-pootras," "Burram Putras," "Brama-pooters," "Brahmas," "Brama Puters," "Brama Poutras," and at last "Brahma Pootras." In the mean time, they were advertised to be exhibited at various fairs in different parts of the country under the above changes of title, varied in certain instances as follows: "Burma Porters," "Bahama Paduas," "Bohemia Prudas," "Bahama Pudras." And, for these three last named, prizes were actually offered at a Maryland fair, in 1851!

The following capital sketch (which appeared originally in the Boston Carpet-Bag) is from the pen of the late Secretary of the Mutual Admiration Society, – a gentleman, and a very happy writer in his way. It gives a faithful and accurate description of what many of these monsters really were, and will be read with gusto by all who have now come to be "posted up" in the secrets of the hen-trade.

The editor of the above-named journal remarks that "as our Carpet-Bag contains something connected with everything under the sun, we have abstracted therefrom a chapter on chicken-craft, which embraces a very important detail of that most abstruse science. When our readers scan the beautiful proportions of the stately fowl that roosts at the head of this article, they will acknowledge that we have some right to cackle because of the good fortune we have had in securing such an uneggsceptionable picture, exhibiting the very perfection of cockadoodledom. Isn't he a beauty, this Bother'em Pootrum?

"Examine his altitude! Observe the bold courage that stands forth in his every lineament! There is no dunghill bravery there! See what symmetry floats round every detail of his noble proportions! What kingly grace associates with the comb that adorns his head as it were a crown! What fire there is in his eye! With what proud bearing does he not wear his abbreviated posterior appendage! Looking at the latter, we, and every one knowing in hen-craft, will readily exclaim, 'Gerenau de Montbeillard! you must have been a most unmitigated muff to designate that beautiful fowl the gallus ecaudatus, or tailless rooster.' For ourselves, our indignity teaches us to say, 'Mons. M.! your Essai sur Historie Nat. des Gallinacæ Fran. tom. ii., pp. 550 et 656, is a humbug!' We know that the universal world will sympathize in our sentiment on this point."

Peter Snooks, Esq. (a correspondent of this journal), it appears, had the honor to be the fortunate possessor of this invaluable variety of fancy poultry, in its unadulterated purity of blood. He furnished from his own yard samples of this rare and desirable stock for His Royal Highness Prince Albert, and also sent samples to several other noted potentates, whose taste was acknowledged to be unquestionable, including the King of Roratonga, the Rajah of Gabble-squash, His Majesty of the Cannibal Islands, and the Mosquito King. Peter supplies the annexed description of the superior properties of this variety of fowls:

"The Bother'em Pootrums are generally hatched from eggs. The original pair were not; they were sent from India, by way of Nantucket, in a whale-ship.

"They are a singularly pictur-squee fowl from the very shell. Imagine a crate-full of lean, plucked chickens, taking leg-bail for their liberty, and persevering around Faneuil Hall at the rate of five miles an hour, and you have an idea of their extremely ornamental appearance.

"They are remarkable for producing bone, and as remarkable for producing offal. I have had one analyzed lately by a celebrated chemist, with the following result:

A peculiarly well-developed faculty in this extraordinary fine breed of domestic fowls is that of eating. "A tolerably well-fed Bother'em will dispose of as much corn as a common horse," insists Mr. S – . This goes beyond me; for I have found that they could be kept on the allowance, ordinarily, that I appropriated daily to the same number of good-sized store hogs. As to affording them all they would eat, I never did that. O, no! I am pretty well off, pecuniarily, but not rich enough to attempt any such fool-hardy experiment as that!

But Snooks is correct about one thing. They are not fastidious or "particular about what they eat." Whatever is portable to them is adapted to their taste for devouring. Old hats, India-rubbers, boots and shoes, or stray socks, are not out-of-the-way fare with them. They are amazingly fond of corn, especially a good deal of it. They will eat wheaten bread, rather than want.

They are very inquisitive in their nature. Their habit of stalking around the dwelling-house, and popping their heads into the garret-windows, is evidence of this peculiar trait.

Their flesh is firm and compact, and requires a great deal of eating to do it justice. Like Barney Bradley's leather "O-no-we-never-mention-'ems," when cut up and stewed for tripe, "a fellow could eat a whole bushel of potatoes to the plateful." It is of the color of a stale red herring, and very much like that edible in taste. Its scarcity constitutes its value.

This rara avis in terris grows to a height somewhere between .00 feet .16 inches and 25 feet. Its weight somewhat between .06 pounds and 1 cwt. It never lays, except when it rolls itself in the sand. The female fowls sometimes do that duty, though amazingly seldom.

Mr. Snooks says he will back his Bother'em, for a chicken-feast, to outcrow any three asthmatical steam-whistles that any railroad company can scare up; and adds, "I am ashamed of the prejudice which makes my fellow-men unjust. The Fowl Society – the New England organization, I mean – repudiate the special merits of my Bother'emPootrums, and tell me that their ideas of improvement go entirely contrary to the propriety of tolerating my noble breed of fowls. Disgustibus non disputandum, as Shakspeare, or somebody for him, emphatically says, – which means, 'Every one to his taste, as the old lady said when she kissed the cow.' One thing it will not be hard to prove, I think; that is, simply the probability of something like envy operating among the members of the Hen Society, on account of the exclusive attention paid my Bother'ems at the late Fowl Fairs in Boston," – where the 'squire's contributions did rather "astonish the boys" who were not thoroughly acquainted with the excellent qualities of these birds. Verily, Snooks' "Bother'ems" did bother 'em exceedingly!

CHAPTER XV.

ADVERTISING EXTRAORDINARY

From the outset of my experience in the final attack of the hen fever, I took advantage of every possible opportunity to disseminate the now world-wide known fact that nobody else but myself possessed any "pure-bred" poultry! I could have proved this by the affidavits of more than a thousand "disinterested witnesses," at any time after April and May, 1851, had I been called upon so to do. But as no one doubted this, there was then no controversy.

But, as time wore along, competition became rife, and the foremost chicken-raisers began to look about them for the readiest means obtainable with which to cut each other's throats; not "with a feather," by any means, because that would have "smelt of the shop;" but whenever, wherever, or however, their neighbors could be traduced, maligned, vilified, or injured (in this pursuit), they embraced the opportunity, and followed it up, without stint, especially towards my humble self, until most of them, fortunately, broke their own backs, and were compelled to retire from the field, while "the people" grinned, and comforted them with the friendly assurance that it "sarved 'em right."

At the Fitchburg Dépôt Show, in 1850, my original "Grey Chittagongs" (already described) were in the possession of G.W. George, Esq., of Haverhill, to whom they had been sold by the party to whom I had previously sold them. Nobody thought well of them; but they took a first prize there, and the "Chittagongs" (so entered at the same time) of Mr. Hatch, of Connecticut, also took a prize. My friend the Doctor then insisted that these were also "Burrampooters;" but, as nobody but himself could pronounce this jaw-cracking name, it was taken little notice of at that time.

Mr. Hatch had a large quantity of the Greys at this show, which sold readily at $12 to $20 the pair; and immediately after this exhibition the demand for "Grey Chittagongs" was very active. I watched the current of the stream, and I beheld with earnest sympathy the now alarming symptoms of the fever. "The people" had suffered a relapse in the disease, and the ravages now promised to become frightful – for a time!

An ambitious sea-captain arrived at New York from Shanghae, bringing with him about a hundred China fowls, of all colors, grades, and proportions. Out of this lot I selected a few grey birds, that were very large, and (consequently) "very fine," of course. I bred these, with other grey stock I had, at once, and soon had a fine lot of birds to dispose of – to which I gave what I have always deemed their only true and appropriate title (as they came from Shanghae), to wit, Grey Shanghaes.

In 1851 and '52 I had a most excellent "run of luck" with these birds. I distributed them all over the country, and obtained very fair prices for them; and, finally, the idea occurred to me that a present of a few of the choicest of these birds to the Queen of England wouldn't prove a very bad advertisement for me in this line. I had already reaped the full benefit accruing from this sort of "disinterested generosity" on my part, toward certain American notables (whose letters have already been read in these pages), and I put my newly-conceived plan into execution forthwith.

I then had on hand a fine lot of fowls, bred from my "imported" stock, which had been so much admired, and I selected from my best "Grey Shanghae" chickens nine beautiful birds. They were placed in a very handsome black-walnut-framed cage, and after having been duly lauded by several first-rate notices in the Boston and New York papers, they were duly shipped, through Edwards, Sanford & Co.'s Transatlantic Express, across the big pond, addressed in purple and gold as follows:

TO H.M.G. MAJESTY,

VICTORIA,

QUEEN OF GREAT BRITAIN

To be Delivered at Zoological Gardens,

LONDON, ENG

—

FROM GEO. P. BURNHAM, BOSTON, MASS., U.S.A

The fowls left me in December, 1852. The London Illustrated News of January 22d, 1853, contained the following article in reference to this consignment:

"By the last steamer from the United States, a cage of very choice domestic fowls was brought to Her Majesty Queen Victoria, a present from George P. Burnham, Esq., of Boston, Mass. The consignment embraced nine beautiful birds – two males and seven pullets, bred from stock imported by Mr. Burnham direct from China. The fowls are seven and eight months old, but are of mammoth proportions and exquisite plumage – light silvery-grey bodies, approaching white, delicately traced and pencilled with black upon the neck-hackles and tips of the wings and tails. The parent stock of these extraordinary fowls weigh at maturity upwards of twenty-three pounds per pair; while their form, notwithstanding this great weight, is unexceptionable. They possess all the rotundity and beauty of the Dorking fowl; and, at the same age, nearly double the weight of the latter. They are denominated Grey Shanghaes (in contradistinction to the Red or Yellow Shanghaes), and are considered in America the finest of all the great Chinese varieties. That they are a distinct race, is evident from the accuracy with which theybreed, and the very close similarity that is shown amongst them; the whole of these birds being almost precisely alike, in form, plumage and general characteristics. They are said to be the most prolific of all the Chinese fowls. At the time of their shipment, these birds weighed about twenty pounds the pair."