INTRODUCTION. 



29 



ever it is offered for sale, purchasers will also 

 be found. 



There is so much truth and practical good 

 sense in the following remarks, by A. B. Allen, 

 in the American Agriculturist, that we can not 

 resist the temptation of transferring them to our 

 pages: "It is within ten years past only that 

 public attention has been somewhat awakened 

 to the true value of poultry as an article of do- 

 mestic stock, or as creatures of sufficient merit 

 and beauty in themselves to render them worth 

 attention beyond the rude clowns of the barn- 

 yard, or the pence-saving economy of the com- 

 mon housewife. In the multiplied objects, how- 

 ever, which increased intelligence and luxury 

 are continually adding to the demands of coun- 

 try life, the resources of the poultry-yard have 

 been drawn into active requisition. The vari- 

 ous species, kinds, varieties, and tribes of the 

 whole domesticated feathered world have been 

 examined, their merits canvassed, and their 

 subjects appropriated to the use, pleasure, and 

 amusement of our people to a degree certainly 

 never equaled since our country had a popula- 

 tion. As a matter of taste they have become 

 a branch of the fine arts 'high art,' as poor 

 Haydon, in his enthusiasm for art-progress, 

 would have called it. 



"There is as much science, taste, and art in 

 breeding poultry ' to a feather,' as in breeding 

 a horse to the highest racing or trotting speed, 

 and to our notion, quite as useful to the world 

 at large and, in their consequences, vastly less 

 productive of the questional commodity of fast 

 men than the latter pursuit. We have sat at 

 the dinner-table where grave and reverend gen- 

 tlemen sipped their wine and bobbed their heads 

 toward each other with the most potential dig- 

 nity, and where wine vaults, the years of their 

 vintage, and the manner of their keeping, were 

 discussed for hours together, and not a single 

 idea eliminated during the whole sitting; and 

 if in place of such a bore, the company could 

 have adjourned to a well-bred poultry-yard, and 

 discussed the merits of its several inhabitants, 

 with the taste and intelligence which they de- 

 served, each one would have been the wiser in 

 head, and better in stomach and body for the 

 inmsition. 



"We are not going to talk now of fowls a* 

 economical things, or as a branch of domestic 

 stock. This question, we take it, has been, 

 from time immemorial, settled in the affirma- 

 tive. For present purposes we are content to 

 consider them as an amusement, an ornament, 

 as a subject of beauty, of interest, and as a study 

 for the leisure hours of the country or the 

 town, or city resident either, if opportunity fa- 

 vors their keeping. Nor are we about to find 

 fault with, or to criticise the taste of any one 

 in the selection of a variety, or the several va- 

 rieties that he may keep, although we frankly 

 confess that we never fancied the monstrous 

 Asiatic fowls that are at present so highly pop- 

 ular. We admire the medium sized and more 

 graceful birds that show finished breeding and 

 high quality, as we would prefer the refined and 

 blood-like Arabian to the large Clydesdale or 

 Canestoga draught horses. Such, however, is 

 only individual opinion, and the wherefore need 

 not at this time be discussed. 



"The great show at Barnum's, contrary to 

 general expectation, brought out altogether the 

 finest, largest, and choicest exhibition ever wit- 

 nessed in America. Of their kinds, there were 

 scarcely a pair of inferior birds in the collection 

 and many fowls came five hundred miles for 

 the occasion. This very fact shows that poul- 

 try fanciers within striking distance of New 

 York have confidence in the society, in its man- 

 agers, in the ability of Mr. Barnum to carry it 

 out, and in his integrity to do w r hat he prom- 

 ised. So far all was well, as, of course, it should 

 be. 



"As an evidence of the interest felt among 

 the fanciers of all ranks and all fortunes, except 

 the rascally low and worthless (not an individ- 

 ual of these, have we learned, that made an of- 

 fering on the occasion), they sent their bird?, 

 generally attended by themselves, and took a 

 lively interest in eveiy thing that appertained 

 to the proceedings. We saw highly distin- 

 guished scientific gentlemen, lawyers, and states- 

 men of great repute ; grave divines, "wise with 

 the lore of centuries;" merchants and com- 

 mercial men, called, by way of eminence, 'mill- 

 ionares ;' artisans, farmers; men of no occupa- 

 tion, sometimes styling themselves, by way <>i' 



