POULTRY.
I have a respect for chickens. The hens have the finest qualities of the
most exemplary mothers; the cocks possess many of the characteristics,
in courage and devotion to “the sex,” of the cavaliers of olden time.
Behold the anxious matron ruffling her feathers and expanding her wings
in threatening defiance of the approaching stranger, or gathering the
little ones under her breast, and exposing her own person to the
swooping hawk. Observe the fierce-eyed rooster guarding his mates with
zealous care, ever ready to meet in deadly conflict the rival or
intruder, but invariably calling his wives to accept any unusual luxury
of fat grub or dainty bug. To be sure, they rise early, which the
uncultivated regard as a virtue, and make much noise when they wake,
crowing at most unseasonable hours; but as for the absurd charges that
the prejudiced author of “Ten Acres Enough” brings against them in
wholesale condemnation, these are not worth answering.
What if they do scratch in the garden, it was clear that they could not
damage mine; and do they not also catch the early worm that destroys the
crop? Besides, chickens are good gastronomically, and eggs undeniable.
They pick up most of their own food, and consequently are economical,
and this, with so careful a calculator as myself, was sufficient. Their
increase is vast, and the profit upon them immense. If every hen should
only raise five broods yearly of ten each, and there were ten hens to
start with, at the end of two years they would number three hundred and
forty-four thousand seven hundred and sixty, after the superfluous
roosters were sold; and then, supposing the extra eggs to have paid for
their keeping, and the produce to be worth only a dollar and a half a
pair, there would be a clear profit of $258,520. Allowing for occasional
deaths, this sum might be stated in round numbers at a quarter of a
million, which would be a liberal increase from ten hens. Of course, I
did not expect to do so well as this, but merely mention what might be
done with good luck and forcing.
Chickens had become very scarce about the time I wanted to purchase.
Whether hens had given up laying eggs or raising young was not clear,
but every old woman in the neighborhood to whom application was made
informed me that chickens were scarce and high, and that she only let me
have them as a special favor. Moreover, the breed of chickens kept at
Flushing is rare and valuable; they were either Shanghais, or Dorkings,
or Black Spanish, or something else extremely precious and desirable,
and none of them were worth less than five dollars a pair. They were
young and small, not yet exhibiting these remarkable attractions; but,
as one old woman observed when I suggested this circumstance, “Sure you
wouldn’t expect a little chicken to be a full-grown hen the moment it
comes out of the shell.” This was so clearly reasonable that I made no
farther objection, but purchased twenty pair of the best to be had. A
coop was built, and the chickens turned in, Patrick remarking, in the
process,
“Indade, they were the smallest lot that iver he saw.”
I explained that they would grow; but he shook his head, and seemed to
doubt it, and immediately proceeded to fill the smallest crevices in the
coop, lest they should creep through.
Patrick fed and I watched these chickens faithfully. They were rather
unhappy-looking things at the start, and as their principal amusement
seemed to be plucking one another’s feathers out at meal-time, their
appearance did not improve. In a few days I observed that they had a
strange way of opening their mouths, as though they were sleepy; but, as
they went to bed at early candlelight, and slept, with little
intermission, except for the occasional recreation of pushing each other
off the perches, till sunrise, it seemed hardly possible, in spite of
their early rising, that they suffered for loss of sleep. If they did
happen to need more rest, no ready way suggested itself of supplying the
deficiency--unless they attended to it themselves, which there was
nothing to prevent--as I was not acquainted with an appropriate lullaby.
So they were left to their own devices. Their yawning became
infectious--as with human beings, when one gapes his companions will
follow suit--until at last one, that seemed to desire to outdo the
others or make up permanently for her lost time, “slept the sleep that
knows no waking.” This was bringing matters to a serious issue; and when
two more were found on a subsequent morning stark and stiff, Weeville
was sent for in all haste. He arrived in a short time with his usual
cheery manner, and inquired “What was the matter now?” as though nothing
ever went wrong with him, and as though he could put right every thing
that went wrong with others. He was shown to the coop, where
thirty-seven chickens were busily engaged opening their mouths every few
seconds, as though they had taken into their throats a very large-sized
grain of corn, and were unable to swallow it. It was an appalling sight.
There was an earnestness and solemnity about their actions that removed
all ludicrousness, and, with a painful feeling of despair, I asked what
could be the matter with them.
“Why, they’ve got the gaps,” Weeville answered at once.
If there is any thing unpleasant, it is to have a friend, whose advice
you have asked on a serious matter--a matter in which your feelings are
interested, if not otherwise very important--take advantage of the
opportunity to indulge his wit. A joke is never a joke when uttered at
the expense of a friend, or of the creatures, human or animal, for which
that friend has an affection. The only way to punish such ill-timed
pleasantry is to appear not to have felt it, and I responded carelessly,
although internally indignant,
“You might better say they had the yawns. But, seriously, what is the
matter with them?”
“I say they have the gaps; a whole black pepper--”
“Never mind carrying the joke any farther,” I replied, firmly. “You may
think it witty to say my chickens have the gaps, and I would laugh if
possible; but, as three of them have died, it is no laughing matter. If
you have nothing more useful to suggest, we will return to the house.”
“I say they have the gaps; don’t you know what that is? It is a regular
disease, coming often from dampness, neglect, or inherent weakness--some
people imagine there is a worm in the chicken’s throat--and is cured by
a change of diet, free exercise, and forcing whole black peppers down
their throats. Let your chickens out of this miserable little hole where
you have been suffocating them, and give them a change of diet,
especially some worms or meat, and compel the worst to swallow a whole
pepper every day or two. You may save a good many of them yet.”
This was an exceedingly suggestive speech. My coop, which was some four
feet square, was called a “hole;” my care and attention were termed
“neglect;” and it was considered possible that I might save a “good
many” of my pets. So I laughed at the idea, ridiculed his remedy, and
told him there was danger that his “whole peppers” would keep them
awake, and make them more “gapy” than ever; but the moment he was gone,
Patrick and I caught every chicken, and, in spite of struggles and
cries, forced two whole peppers--for two were certainly better than
one--down the throat of each, and turned them out of the coop.
They did not seem to be much improved by the operation, and went
“gaping” round the premises in a miserable way, leaving one of their
number dead here and another there, till they happened to attract the
attention of my neighbor’s pups. I have referred to these pups before.
They were playful creatures; if there was any horrible and disgusting
injury that they could, in a frolicsome mood, inflict upon me, they
never missed the chance. They tore up the sticks that I set to mark my
flowers; they scratched and dug in my strawberry bed, which I had
succeeded in planting before the summer was over; they dragged in every
direction my clothes that were laid out to bleach; they tormented my
favorite cat; they appeared to think of nothing but plan deviltry
against me, and do nothing but execute it. When the more flagrant of
these wrongs had from time to time been inflicted, my neighbor called to
apologize blandly and express his regrets, but never once proposed to
kill the dreadful brutes.
The moment these pups saw my chickens they started after them. The
fluttering, squawking, and barking attracted my attention, and I gave
chase to the pups. Away we went, chickens screeching with fear, the pups
yelping with delight, and I storming with rage: “Come here! get out! go
home! how dare you?”
If there had been one pup, I might have stood a chance; but, “being in
doubt where to begin,” I “both neglected.” Each pounced on a chicken--of
course, the largest and healthiest--and squeezed the breath out of them
in a moment, and did not even give me the sweet satisfaction of revenge;
but, having effected their object, and seeing me approach, stick in
hand, bent on exemplary punishment, they each dropped their prey, and,
darting through the neighboring fence, secured their retreat, or, as
army men have it, “saved their bacon.” This little amusement was renewed
daily, and Patrick was continually on guard against a sortie of the
enemy. But we became more skillful with practice, and a few
well-directed blows and successful shots sent the enemy howling to the
rear, and demoralized him greatly. Our chickens, however, had somewhat
diminished in number; there were the killed, wounded, and missing,
leaving quite a moderate residue. Moreover, there was a gentleman of
Irish extraction living close by, who had kept chickens before I had;
but it seemed to me that his flock increased as mine diminished, and I
even thought that I recognized some of my “lost ones.” It may be that
they went there for safety, although, if any questions were asked, he
could always explain how he came by that particular bird, and give its
entire history, and the man’s name that he bought it from.
When the pups were repressed and the gaps cured, and my remaining
chickens--which were reduced to ten--were persuaded to stay at home, and
when they had become large enough to give promise of future usefulness
and eggs, Patrick was directed to prepare boxes for them to lay in. He
filled these half full of soft hay, and deposited a white glass
nest-egg, which cost twenty-five cents apiece, in each, and fastened
them up in the most enticing locations. But the chickens did not seem to
fancy the nests; in fact, they did not appear to turn their minds to
laying at all, but were contented to “eat, drink, and be merry,” without
regard to their philoprogenitive duties. Patrick suggested that a little
“mate” might bring them up to the required point, and, when that failed,
said something about lime being required to make the shells; but I did
not see the necessity for shells till we had the “filling” ready.
Certainly every inducement was offered those chickens to lay; they had
abundant “feeds” of meal, and oats, and wheat, with “mate” twice a day,
like an Irish servant-girl; they had the grazing of the entire “five
acres,” and most attractive boxes, but they did not seem to improve
their opportunities. I had concluded that they were such a rare breed
that they could not afford to overstock the market, and no longer
wondered at their monstrous price, when Patrick rushed in to announce
that the big Dominick--by which name he insisted upon calling a bird
that had been sold to me as a Black Spanish of the most valuable
kind--had a nest full of eggs.
“Sure and I jist found her out, the cunning baste; she stole her nest on
me, and has it full of the purtiest eggs yez iver saw.”
“Well, Patrick, that is a good sign; you must look round and find some
more; they are all doubtless laying. Now go and bring me the eggs that
you have found.”
“Bring in the eggs, is it?”
“Certainly; it is too late in the year for setting.”
“Sure, and how am I to do that?”
“Why, go and take them; you’re not afraid of a hen?”
“But how am I to get there?”
“Walk, of course; what do you mean by talking to me in that way?”
“I don’t mane any thing at all, at all, but I can’t get the eggs unless
your honor pulls down the barn. The old spalpeen has settled herself
right under the middle of the flure, and meself spied her out through
the cracks.”
Sure enough, there she was. Utterly regardless of all the attractive
boxes and imitation eggs, she had crawled away where only a rat could
follow, and where a rat would, in the end, be sure to follow her, and
had made her nest under the centre timber of the barn floor. There were
two ways of reaching her--either by digging a tunnel such as our
prisoners made at Libby, or by taking up the planks. As both of these
modes would have cost somewhat more than the eggs were worth, even
supposing she was a Black Spanish and not a Dominick--about which, I
confess, I occasionally had some doubts--we never enjoyed more than a
dim view through the dirty cracks of our “hidden treasures.”
This, however, was rather encouraging; another hen might conclude to
lay, and might select a more eligible situation. It was a difficult
matter to get under the barn, and the next one might not be willing to
take the trouble, even for the satisfaction of putting her master at
defiance. But alas! the very next day Patrick waked me at daylight to
announce that the fowls were “all dead entirely.”
After a vain attempt to understand him, I hurried on my clothes, and,
rushing to the coop where they were accustomed to roost, found it empty,
and their murdered corpses scattered about in every direction. The small
wounds, the unruffled feathers, the universal massacre, showed that a
mink had done the deed. My chickens, my rare and valuable chickens, that
were to have laid so many eggs and raised such countless posterity; the
roosters, that were to have been fathers of a long line of famous
descendants; the hens, that were to have been models of matronly
propriety and parental self-sacrifice; my pets, that I had raised
through so many dangers, that I had saved from one neighbor’s flock and
another neighbor’s pups; my profits, that were to have put the author of
“Ten Acres Enough” to silence, were cut off forever. Golden visions of
eggs were destroyed; anticipations of tender spring broilers were
disappointed; my quarter of a million of prospective profits--all were
annihilated together by a mink.
We killed that mink. Like Oliver Twist, he returned for more, and met
his fate. I had him stuffed, for one mink-skin is certainly a curious
result from an investment of twenty pairs of chickens.