I caused a copy to be taken from this portrait of the Queen, and have had it engraved for this book; it appears as the frontispiece.
Immediately after this paragraph appeared, a new zest appeared to have been given to the Grey Shanghae trade. Orders came from Canada and from Nova Scotia to a very considerable amount; and during this season my sales were again very large. During the year 1853, I started and raised over sixteen hundred chickens of all kinds; but this did not supply my orders. I bought largely, and paid high prices, too, generally. But few persons were now doing any business in the fowl-trade, except myself, however.
The N.Y. Spirit of the Times published portraits of the birds sent to the Queen, and remarked that "the engraving represented six of the nine beautiful Grey Shanghae fowls lately presented to Her Majesty Victoria, Queen of Great Britain, by George P. Burnham, Esq., of Boston, Mass.
"These birds were forwarded by one of the last month's Collins steamers, in charge of Adams & Co.'s Express, and passed through this city on the 24th ult. Their extraordinary size and fine plumage were the admiration of all who examined them. The picture is from life, engraved by Brown, and is a faithful representation of the birds, which are very closely bred.
"The color of this variety of the China fowl is a light silver-grey, approximating to white; the body is a light downy white, sparsely spotted and pencilled with metallic black in the tail and wing tips; the legs are feathered to the toes, and the form is unexceptionable for a large fowl; this variety having proved the biggest of all the 'Shanghaes' yet imported into this State.
"The two cocks above delineated weighed between ten and eleven pounds each at six months old; the pullets drew seven and a half to nine pounds each at seven to eight months old; the original imported pair of old ones now weigh upwards of twenty-three pounds, together. In the existing rage for weighty birds, this variety will naturally satisfy the ambition of those who go for the 'biggest kind' of fowls!
"The group represents this variety with accuracy, and are, without doubt, for their kind, rare specimens of the genuine gallus giganteus of modern ornithologists. As Her Majesty has long been known among the foremost patrons of that agreeable branch of rural pursuits, poultry-raising, we do not doubt but that this splendid present from Mr. Burnham will prove highly gratifying to her tastes in this particular."
Portraits of these fowls appeared in Gleason's Pictorial for January, 1853, and the editor spoke as follows of them:
"The Grey Shanghae Fowls lately presented to Her Majesty Queen Victoria, of Great Britain, by George P. Burnham, Esq., of Boston, were extraordinary specimens of domestic poultry, and were bred the past season by Mr. Burnham from stock imported by him direct from China. They were universally admitted, by the thousands who saw them before they left, to be the largest and choicest-bred lot of chickens ever seen together in this vicinity. These fowls were from the same broods as those lately sent to Northby, of Aldborough, by Mr. Burnham, who is, perhaps, the most successful poultry-raiser in America; and while these beautiful birds are creditable to him as a breeder, they are a present really 'fit for a queen.'"