THE HEN FEVEK. 67 



dred pairs of fowls " that would astonish him and his neigh- 

 bors." Within three weeks from the date of my reply to 

 him, I received a sight draft from the Bank of Louisiana 

 upon the Merchants' Bank, Boston, for fifteen hundred 

 dollars. I sent him such an invoice of fowls as pleased 

 him, and I have no doubt he was (as he seemed to be) per- 

 fectly satisfied that he had thus made the best trade he ever 

 consummatjd in the whole course of his life. 



During the next spring I bred largely again, and sup- 

 plied all the best fanciers in New England and New York 

 State with stock, fi:om which they bred continually during 

 that and the succeeding year. 



In the spring of 1852 the Mutual Admiration Society 

 of hen-men got up their third show, at the Fitchburg 

 Depot (in May, I think), where a goodly exhibition came 

 off, and where there were now fowls for sale of every con- 

 ceivable color and description, good, bad, and indifferent. I 

 contributed as usual, and, as usual, carried away the palm 

 for the best samples shown. And here was evinced some 

 of the shifts to which certain hucksters resorted, to make 

 "the people" believe that white was black, that they 

 originally brought this subject before the public eye, and 

 that they only possessed the pure stock then in the country. 



Reverends, and doctors, and deacons, and laymen, — all 

 were there, in force. Every man cried down every other 

 man's fowls, while he as strenuously cried up his ow.n. Upon 



