He kindly undertook to aid me. I engaged three engravers, who worked day and night upon the drawings and transfers of the fowls for my illustrations; the paper was wet down on Monday and Tuesday; I read the final revised proof of my work on Wednesday night; the book went to press on Thursday; the binders were ready for it as it came up, the covers were put on on Friday morning, and I sent to the New York house (who had bespoken them), by Harnden's Express, on Friday evening, three thousand five hundred copies of the "New England Poultry-Breeder," illustrated with twenty-five correct engravings of my choice, magnificent, superb, unapproachable, pure-bred fowls.
This book had an extraordinary sale,—far beyond my own calculations, certainly. I got it out for the purpose of "doing justice" to my own stock, and calculated that it would prove a good advertising medium for me,—which it did, by the way. But the demand for the "New England Poultry-Breeder" was immense. And thirteen different editions (varying from three thousand five hundred to one thousand copies each) were issued within as many weeks, and were sold, every copy of them. This is the true history of the "New England Poultry-Breeder."
By and by Dr. Bennett's book appeared. The market was now glutted with this kind of thing, and this work, though a good one, generally, dragged on the hands of its originators. I doubt if a thousand copies of this book ever found their way into the market, the author being too deeply engrossed with his then thriving trade, to trouble himself about urging the sale of his book, or of thinking about the interests of his publishers.
CHAPTER V.
THREATENING INDICATIONS.
Another meeting was now called at the Statehouse, which was even more fully attended than the first, and at which much more serious indications of enthusiasm were apparent.
Old men, and middle-aged farmers, and florists, and agriculturists, and live-stock breeders, from all parts of this and the neighboring states, congregated together on this eventful occasion, and entered into the debate with an earnestness worthy of so important and "glorious" a cause.
Some of the speakers had by this time got to be so elated and so ardent that they rehearsed all they knew, and some of them told of a great deal more than themselves or anybody else had ever dreamed of, bearing upon the subject of poultry-raising. But, really, the subject was an exciting one, and the talkers were excusable; they couldn't help it!
Shades of morus multicaulis victims! Shadows of defunct tulip-growers! Spirits of departed Merino sheep speculators! Ghosts of dead Berkshire pig fanciers! Where were ye all on that eventful night, when six hundred sober, "respectable" representatives of "the people" were assembled within the walls of our time-honored state edifice upon Beacon Hill, in serious and animated conclave, to decide the momentous question that "hens was hens," notwithstanding, nevertheless!