There is no question about the accuracy of this statement. The writer says he "knows that such things were done;" and I feel sure that no man in New York State ever knew the details of this dodge so well as he did. It was a very common thing everywhere, however, among the hucksters. I had no occasion to resort to this plan; for the game we played was a deeper one, altogether.
There was a "live Yankee," all the way from Rhode Island, who attended the New York show, who took the boys down there after the following style, as appears from another advertisement, which I recently met with, and which feat is thus described by one of the sufferers. In a "card" published soon after that exhibition, this victim of misplaced confidence says, with a show of seeming injured innocence:
"Justice to the public, as well as myself, demands a slight explanation of a few facts connected with the recent National Poultry Show, in New York City.
"Mr. C——, of Woonsocket, R.I., accompanied me to New York for the purpose of attending the fair. On the fourth day of the exhibition it was announced that the judges were about to commence their labors. Mr. C——, seeing that his chance for a premium of any kind on Asiatic fowls was very slim, came to me and requested, nay, even insisted, on grounds of mutual friendship, that I should put my two best hens with a cock of his, for the purpose of taking the first premium. I finally consented, with the express understanding, and no other, that we should each share the honors and proceeds equally. On Friday it was announced, in the lecture-room, that he had taken the first premium on the best pair of Asiatic fowls, of whatever sub-variety. I went to him, at once, and expressed my dissatisfaction, and reminded him of his agreement. He then agreed to see the secretary and all the reporters, and publish, or cause to be published, a card, stating that I was equally entitled to the premium with himself, as the hens were raised by me; and he furthermore agreed that his name should not be mentioned or published, in relation to the premium, except in connection with my own. How was that agreement fulfilled? On taking up one of the New York dailies the next morning, I was surprised to see a puff laudatory of Mr. C——, while my name was not alluded to,—which puff, report says, was paid for with a rooster. On my return home, a few days afterwards, I found that he had volunteered to make the following assertions: 'Well, I have laid 'em all out. I took the first premium on everything, best pair and all, and I can beat the world.' When asked how it was done, he said, 'I will tell you, some time, how I played my card.'"
But Mr. C——, with that reserve and indifference peculiar to gentlemen in the hen-trade who have accomplished a "neat operation," did not see fit to explain the process, and hesitated to inform his "friend" how he played his card. And so the aggrieved party resorted to the newspaper, and come the "power of the press" upon Mr. C——, as follows:
"Mr. C—— stated that my stock was 'mongrel,' and inferior. Whether it be so or not, is for the thousands and tens of thousands who saw them, while on exhibition, to judge. After selecting two of my best hens for Mr. C——'s especial benefit (as it appears), the committee even then saw fit to award me a premium, while his two coops of 'pure, full-blooded Asiatic fowls,' which he had cracked up so loud and extensively, did not receive, as I can learn, even a passing notice, except the old cock, which was put in the coop with my 'mongrel hens,' as he is pleased to call them. Perhaps the public would also be gratified to learn the manner in which he obtained the first premium at the recent Agricultural Fair in Providence, R.I. Was it not done by entering several coops of fowls, belonging to another person, in his own name, without that person's knowledge and consent, and pointing out those fowls to one or more of the judges, representing them as his own? No doubt the books of the society, and those of the railroad corporation which conveyed Mr. C——'s poultry to and from the fair, if compared, will throw some light upon the subject. Is not this the manner in which he has frequently played his card; or, in other words, 'laid 'em all out'? As I have always treated him as a gentleman, a neighbor and friend, to what cause can I impute this low, mean contemptible and underhand manner of exalting himself at my expense? I would advise him, in conclusion, to peruse Æsop's moral and instructive fable of the ambitious Jackdaw, and learn from that, that however well a course of deception and duplicity may at first prosper, the day of exposure and disgrace will come, and the ungainly Jackdaw, stripped of his ill-gotten plumage, will stand forth in all his native blackness and deformity."
Now, I have no doubt, that this Mr. C——, when he read the above "card" (which must have cost its author considerable time and money), felt very badly about it, the more especially as the show-prizes had been duly announced, and he had the premium-money safely in his own pocket! And it certainly must have been a very gratifying circumstance, to the man who had been thus duped, to see his advertisement thus in print, too. Had I been similarly situated, however, after losing my premium and the credit that belonged to my having had the best fowls on exhibition, also (only by thus joining issue with another to gull the "dear people"), I rather think I should not have published the facts, to show myself up a fool as well as a knave. But this is merely a matter of taste. Mr. B——, who signs this "card," will scarcely be caught in this way again. We "live to learn."
Mr. B—— had not become apprised of the fact that, from the very commencement, the hen-trade was a huge gull, possessing an unconscionable maw, and most inconceivable powers of digestion. Older heads and wiser men than he had been duped or swallowed by this monster, that stalked about the earth for six long years, seeking whom he might devour. If this is the worst treatment he ever experienced at the hands of those who helped to feed the vampire, Mr. B—— is, indeed, a fortunate man. There be those who would gladly exchange places with this gentleman, and give him large odds.
C—— was smart. I have known him for several years. He is one of the few "hen-men" whom I would trust alone with my purse. And whether he raised them, or purchased them, it matters nothing; he has sold some of the best fowls in America.
In all human probability, the author of the "card" last quoted will live long enough (unless he shall have already stepped out) to know that "the people" went into the hen-trade blindfolded, and that the bandages have now dropped from their eyes. He will have ascertained, too, I think, that a resort to the newspapers for redress against such of his "friends" as may get ahead of his time in this way is precious poor consolation, when he reflects that advertisements cost money, and that the anathemas of an over-reached chicken-man have never yet been known to harm anybody—as far as heard from! Selah!