BURSTING OF THE BUBBLE.
My friend John Giles, of Woodstock, Conn., has somewhere said, of late,
"I often hear that the 'fowl' fever is dying out. If by this is meant
the unhealthy excitement which we have had for a few years past, for
one, I say the sooner that it dies out the better. But as to the
enthusiasm of _true_ lovers of the feathered tribe dying out, it never
will, as long as man exists. It is part of God's creation. The thinking
man loves and admires his Maker's work; always did; always will. And I
have not the least doubt that any enterprising young man, with a
suitable place and fancier's eye, would find it to his advantage to
embark in the enterprise of fowl-raising for market."
Now, I don't know but John is honest in this assertion,--that is, I can
imagine that he believes in this theory! But how he can ever have
arrived at such a conclusion (with the results of his own experience
before him), is more than I _can_ comprehend.
Laying aside all badinage, for the moment, I think it may be presumed
that I have had some share of experience in this business,
_practically_, and I think I can speak advisedly on this subject. As far
back as during the years 1839, '40 and '41, I erected, in Roxbury, a
poultry establishment on a large scale, upon a good location, where I
had the advantages of ample space, twenty separate hen-houses, running
water and a fine pond on the premises, glass-houses (cold, and
artificially heated, for winter use), and every appurtenance, needful or
ornamental, was at my command.
I purchased and bred all kinds of domestic fowls there, and they were
attended with care from year's end to year's end. But there was _no_
profit whatever resulting from the undertaking,--and why?
The very week that a _mass_ of poultry--say three to five hundred
fowls--is put together _upon one spot_, they begin to suffer, and fail,
and retrograde, and die. No amount of care, cleanliness or watching, can
evade this result. _In a body_ (over a dozen to twenty together), they
cannot thrive; nor can the owner coax or force them to lay eggs, by any
known process.[17]
To succeed with the breeding of poultry, the stock must be _colonized_
(if a large number of fowls be kept), or else only a few must find
shelter in any one place, about the farm or country residence. And my
experience has taught me that five hens together will yield more eggs
than fifty-five together will in the same number of months.
I honestly assert, to-day, that of all the humbug that exists, or which
has been made to exist, on this subject, no part of it is more glaringly
deceptive, in my estimation, than that which contends for the _profit_
that is to be gained _by breeding poultry_--_as a business by
itself_--_for market consumption_. The idea is preposterous and
ridiculous, and no man can accomplish it,--I care not _what_ his
facilities may be,--to any great extent, _upon a single estate_. The
thing is impossible; and I state this, candidly, after many years of
practical experience among poultry, on a liberal scale, and in the
possession of rare advantages for repeated experiment.
I do not say that certain persons who have kept a _few_ fowls (from
twenty-five to a hundred, perhaps), and who have looked after them
carefully, may not have realized a profit upon them, in connection with
the farm. But, to make it a business _by itself_, I repeat it, a _mass_
of domestic and aquatic fowls cannot be kept together to any advantage
whatever, their produce to be disposed of at ordinary market value.
The fever for the "fancy" stock broke out at a time when money was
plenty, and when there was no other speculation rife in which every one,
almost, could easily participate. The prices for fowls increased with
astonishing rapidity. The whole community rushed into the breeding of
poultry, without the slightest consideration, and the mania was by no
means confined to any particular class of individuals--though there was
not a little shyness among certain circles who were attacked at first;
but this feeling soon gave way, and our first men, at home and abroad,
were soon deeply and riotously engaged in the subject of henology.
Meantime, in England they were doing up the matter somewhat more
earnestly than with us on this side of the water. To show how even the
nobility never "put their hand to the plough and look back" when
anything in this line is to come off, and the better to prove how fully
the poultry interests were looked after in England, I would point to the
names of those who, from 1849 to 1855, patronized the London and
Birmingham associations for the improvement of domestic poultry.
The Great Annual Show, at Bingley Hall, was got up under the sanction of
His Royal Highness Prince Albert, the Duchess of Sutherland, Lady
Charlotte Gough, the Countess of Bradford, Rt. Hon. Countess of
Littlefield, Lady Chetwynd, Hon. Viscountess Hill, Lady Littleton, Hon.
Mrs. Percy, Lady Scott, and a host of other noble and royal lords and
ladies, whose names are well known among the lines of English
aristocracy.
But, as time advanced, the star of Shanghae-ism began to wane. The
nobility tired of the excitement, and the people of England and of the
United States began to ascertain that there was absolutely nothing in
this "hum," save what the "importers and breeders" had made, through the
influence of the newspapers; and while a few of the _last men_ were
examining the thickness of the shell, cautiously and warily, the
long-inflated bubble burst! and, as the fragments descended upon the
devoted heads of the unlucky star-gazers, a cry was faintly heard, from
beneath the ruins--"_Stand from under_!"
I had been watching for this climax for several months; and when the
explosion occurred, as nearly as I can "cal-'late," _I_ wasn't _thar_!
[17] Since this was written, I find in the _Country Gentleman_ a
communication from L.F. Allen, Esq., on this very subject, in which he
says that "A correspondent desires to know how to build a chicken-house
for 'about one thousand fowls.' If my poor opinion is worth anything,
_he will not build it at all_. Fowls, in any large number, will not
thrive. Although I have seen it tried, I never knew a large collection
of several hundred fowls succeed _in a confined place_. I have known
sundry of these enterprises tried; but I never knew one _permanently_
successful. They were all, in turn, abandoned." The thing is entirely
impracticable.