4 CAPONS FOR PROFIT. 
put an end to its life and to my enjoyment. I could 
not have grieved more had I lost a fortune. 
A dozen years later, at the age when a person 
knows more than all the rest of mankind, I could 
see golden opportunities in poultry raising as a 
business Poultry papers and poultry writers had 
told me of the lot of money that might be made by 
raising chicks and eggs for market. Estimating 
profits on paper, from imaginary figures, is always 
an easy enough matter. One hen gives $1.00 a year 
clear profit; 1,000 hens must give $1,000. That was 
as clear as day light, and needed no proof. Any- 
how, if I had no acquaintance with the real facts, I 
had unlimited faith in these figures, for figures can- 
not lie; and if I was without practical 
experience, I was fully convinced of 
my own superior smartness. If others had suc- 
ceeded, I could, and possibly in a greater degree. 
So I made my plans, and racked my brains about 
the construction of an incubator and brooders, etc., 
things little thought of in those times. Next I be- 
gan active operations with about 150 laying hens 
which were kept for the purpose of getting eggs to 
sell in the openmarket. It did not take.me long to 
find out that 150 hens housed in one building, no 
matter how large, will not lay 10 times as many 
eggs as 15 hens kept by themselves, and given a 
large range. Grain was then much dearer than it is 
now, although I grew what corn and oats I needed, 
and eggs were selling at the lowest prices I have 
ever either paid or received for them. In short the 
outcome was so discouraging that, instead of in- 
creasing my stock of layers, as originally intended, 
Do Figures Lie? 
