388 



FANCIERS' JOURNAL AND POULTRY EXCHANGE. 



doing what they would have done if placed in the same 

 circumstances. 



In my next article I shall notice the work of the Conven- 

 tion ; but, as absence from home will prevent me from 

 writing anything further for several weeks, or even reading 

 what others may write, I will add a word or two with 

 regard to Mr. Burnham's criticism of the standard for 

 Brahmas. 



Mr. B. endeavors to ridicule the idea of making a differ- 

 ent standard for the two classes of fowls, and yet in another 

 article he objects to a mere " theoretical standard." Now, 

 the Convention believed that there is just this difference 

 between the two varieties found in the flocks of the best 

 breeders. Mr. B. has his theory that they ought to be alike. 

 Perhaps they were in the old days of the "Hen Fever," 

 when certain parties practiced on the credulity of the 

 public, and brought the business into disrepute, but they 

 are not the same to-day, as Mr. B. will find if he will visit 

 a few of the leading poultry shows where first-class birds 

 are exhibited. With Mr. B.'s experience it is not necessary 

 to inform him that fashion and type of fowl's change, and 

 very great changes are possible, and instead of making an 

 arbitrary standard to suit their own views, they conformed 

 the standard to the actual facts of the case, as shown in the 

 decisions of the best judges, and as seen in the fowls of the 

 most prominent breeders. F. K. W. 



Jos. M. Wade, Esq. 



Dear Sir : I am tired of seeing so much of the valuable 

 space taken up in your paper in the discussion of the old 

 and new Standard of Excellence. I think they can discuss 

 this question all summer, and then be just as far off as when 

 they commenced. There might be one made every week, 

 and you would find some one that is competent to pick out 

 flaws in it; it is so in everything. I have been in the mili- 

 tary service the most of the time since I was fifteen years 

 old (am now over forty), and we have had tactics from Scott, 

 x Hardee, Cameron, Casey, Upton's first, and now Upton's 

 second, and military men could always find faults in them ; 

 anii it will be just the same if you get up another standard 

 now\ I do not propose to enter into this discussion, but I 

 want to say something in regard to the Brahmas. Mr. 

 Burnham thinks the standard ought to be the same for the 

 Eight and Dark. I think the new standard is nearer right, 

 and I will tell you why : I have tried the Eight and Dark 

 Brahmas — Dark five years and Light about ten years. I 

 think there is a difference between them besides the color. 

 If Mr. Burnham breeds them now, he may have two strains 

 that are alike as to shape, form, &c. — mine are not. I think 

 the two differ very nearly as much as the Cochins and 

 Brahmas do. Because they are both called Brahmas that is 

 no reason, as I look at it, that they shall be the same form, 

 shape, &c, any more than they should be the same color. 

 Their combs, of course, are supposed to be pea, or the same. 

 Now, Mr. Editor, I think the gentlemen who made up the 

 new standard for the Brahma fowls knew what they were 

 about. 



One word about leg feathering. I have had about one 

 hundred Dark Brahma chicks hatched out this year, and 

 nearly every one of them have been feathered down the leg 

 to the tips of outer toe, and on the outside of middle toe 

 (when hatched). Now, this is natural. [Yes, to the young 

 ones ; they do not always mature so. — Ed.] 



I have had hatched out about fifty Light Brahmas this 

 year, and nearly every one has been feathered down the leg 

 to the tips of the outer toes, but no feathers on the middle 

 toes. This, I think, is natural also ; and this difference, I 

 think, is the reason why the new standard is made as it is 

 in regard to the leg. 



If any one will look at the old standard and then at the 

 new one on the Brahmas, they will see at once how much 

 better the new one defines the Brahmas than the old one 

 does. Take the head, for instance. The old one does not 

 tell you anything about the make of it, while the new is so 

 plain that any boy can understand it, and I think it is the 

 making of the bird, and ought to count more than any 

 other part. 



I think we had better let well enough alone for a while. 

 If you get up another standard, you will have a division 

 and two standards, and then we shall be worse off than we 

 are now. Bespectfully yours, W. M. W. 



Peabody, Mass., May 25, 1874. 



POULTS DEf^ T IVlEfJ T . 



(For Fanciers' Journal.) 



THE HISTORY OF THE HEN FEVER. 



A HUMOROUS RECORD. 



BY GEO. P. BTJRNHAM. 



Prince Henk y.— What ! Fought you with them all t 



Falstaff.— All ? I know not what ye call all. But if I fought not 

 with fifty of them, I am a bunch of radish. 



P. Hen. — Pray heaven, you have not murdered some of them! 



Fals.— Nay, that's past praying for. I have peppered two of them ; 

 two, I am sure, I have paid. Two chaps in buckram suits. 



[King Henry IV, Act 2d. 

 Joseph M. Wade, Esq. 



My Dear Sir : So many inquiries have latterly been 

 made for copies of the above volume, written by me in 1855 

 (which, as its title-page above quoted plainly indicated, was 

 purely a burlesque of a humorous character), and which in 

 the light of to-day I admit might as well never have been 

 written at all — that once for all, I now ask room for a brief 

 paper on this book (long ago out of print), especially on 

 account of the spunky article in your last number addressed 

 to me, by a Mr. Athole, of New York. 



Poultry fanciers of the present time, Mr. Editor, are not 

 all so thin-skinned as Mr. Athole appears to be. In the days 

 whenmy above-named amusing " History of the Hen Fever" 

 was published, however, there were a good many just such 

 "fanciers " about; and to show up them, their follies, and 

 their hum buggery, this work was then printed. It was pen- 

 ned in a playful spirit of homely bandinage, only ; and, as is 

 stated in its preface, " written in perfect good nature, with 

 the design to gratify its readers, to offend no man living, 



