INFLUENCE OF IDEAS ON CONDUCT. 141 



Ignorance, but may be attributed to erookeilness, is a condition wliicb, for all we can see now, 

 must continue indefinitely, for each year the industry lakes in a considerable body of new 

 recruits, and there is no apparent diminution in the confidence of novices in their judgment 

 of fowls. So we have always the same mistalies made, but made mostly by newcomers. I 

 am speaking now of the great body of errors that furnish occasion for charges and rumors 

 of crookedness and fraud, not of the occasional instances of Intentional crookedness. Sulj- 

 stantially all of those who continue In the business show by their later conduct in it that the 

 errors of the first years were errors in judgment — not intentional frauds. 



There is another side to the story of errors of this class. A considerable proportion of the 

 buyers of poultry are even more ignorant of quality and value than the average novice selling 

 poultry, and no whit less confident In their own judgment of these points. Such buyers are 

 prone to find fault when no ground for faultfinding exists; not always because they are dis- 

 posed to find fault, but because their ideas of quality in fowls are badly distorted. These 

 buyers, too, as they grow in experience and judgment, mostly pass out of the class who have 

 many stories to tell to illustrate the prevalence of fraud and deceit in the poultry business. 



While there are to be found here and there persons who, even after they are competent 

 judges of the goods of different kinds handled in this industry and its allied branches, are still 

 so much impressed by the evils they do see and meet that they see them out of proportion to 

 the transactions which involve no crookedness, the bad reputation for morality, as is given the 

 poultry business, does not in general get much confirmation from those who know the business. 

 Among them it is regarded, as in fact it is, as neither better nor worse in a general way than 

 other lines. The importance to the poultryman, whether a dealer or a buyer, of appreciating 

 the real moral status of the industry is found in the connection between his ideas of business 

 morality among poultrymen, and his own standards of practice in selling, and the attitude 

 which he takes when buying. If one who has poultry to sell believes that the general moral 

 tone in such transactions is low, he will often — perhaps unintentionally — be less careful in 

 his own dealings than he would be if he believed that the usual practice was to give honest 

 values. It is human nature to measure conduct by that of others, and to be satisfied if we can 

 feel that we are a little better than the average. If one who is buying poultry believes that 

 all dealers in fowls are rogues looking always for opportunities to defraud, and indifferent as 

 to whether customers are suited or not so long as they get their money and escape the penalties, 

 of their practices, he is afraid to be satisfied with what he gets, and is apt to condemn it on 

 general principles first, and then begin to look for specific faults. 



Some Specific Alleged Evils of the Poultry Business. 



When we say that the poultry business is neither better nor worse, on the whole, in moral 

 tone, than the community, we admit that it contains a great deal of evil. 1 have already said 

 that a very large proportion of the evils in the poultry business — of the wrongs done by 

 poultrymen in their dealings with each other — consists of unintentional evils which most 

 poultrymen avoid after they have learned wherein they were at fault. Another considerable 

 proportion of the wrongs of which complaint is made consists of disappointments which come 

 — according to my view — as phases of the ordinary risks of the business. In a great many 

 cases these two classes of unsatisfactory incidents are mixed, both contributing to make the 

 unsatisfactory situation. So, it vvould be difficult to make any hard and fast classification of 

 evils according to causes, and I shall not attempt to do so, but simply mention a number of 

 the most common sins attributed to poultrymen, and discuss each in order. 



Doctoring Eggs for Hatching. 



A beginner in poultry culture buys eggs for hatching, and gets nothing at all, or a few 

 chicks from them. He is disappointed and sore. An acquaintance professing to be acquainted 

 with the ways of poultrymen, suggests that probably the eggs were infertile, or were treated 

 in some way to prevent their hatching. He will say positively that this is a common practice 

 amon<' breeders of fine stock who wish at the same time to get an income from their stock 

 commensurate with its quality and reputation, and to prevent their customers becoming their 

 Buccessful competitors. So much is said and has been said with great positiveness in regard 



