THE HEN FEVER. 187 



whom had been through the routine, and " knew every rope 

 in the ship ; " none of whom were aflected with the 

 " fever " (so they always declared), and not one of whom 

 believed, while they were thus striving to pull wool over 

 the eyes of others, that they were all the time being 

 " shaken down " without mercy ! 



This was the very class of men who, in the later days 

 of the malady, assisted most to keep up the delusion, and to 

 aid in carrying on the hum of the trade. To be sure, 

 the keepers of agricultural warehouses talked, and told big 

 stories to their poor customers, who would buy eggs and 

 chickens of them, for a while, at round prices ; true, most of 

 the agricultural papers strove from week to week to keep 

 up the deceit, after the editors or proprietors found their 

 yards over-stocked with this species of property, for which 

 they had originally paid me (or somebody else) roundly, 

 and which they "couldn't afford to lose," though they 

 knew it to be valueless ! True, the hen-men themselves 

 kept their advertising and the big stories of their success 

 constantly before "the people," whom they gulled from 

 day to day. But no portion of the community did more 

 ^ to " help the cause along " than did this self-suflScient, 

 learned, know-nothhig, thin-skinned class of " wise-acres," 

 who never chanced to make much more than a considerable 

 out of the writer of this paragraph — I think ! 



Among this well-informed (?) set of men there was 



