The Birmingham age-herald., 1904-04-17
DAME PARTLET |S INDUSTRIOUS BIRD Lays More Than One Billion
 Dozen Eggs a Year 8EAIS COTTON AND WHEAT Value of Annua' Egg Production of United Sites is Greater Than
 Any Other Commodity
 in the Country.
BEATS COTTON AND WHEAT

 the Easter gift that the American hen has presented to the United States.
 If the government were to decide to color up all the eggs That are being laid by her in one day, to present to the children of the country, the whole regu- lar army couldn't do the work unless each soldier could manage to color 700 eggs, which is a pretty big contract.
 As the country will consume not one days, but several days laying of eggs, the standing army would be literally overwhelmed. hidden, crushed by the work of the hen
 Her work produces enough eggs in any two days to give one to every hu- man being from Alaska to Porto Rico, not leaving out the Eskimos of Boring straits.
 Forty-two and one-half millions of eggs a day is her average now. That gigsn- tie one days work weighs 265s tons-al- most as much as the tonnage of United States cruiser like the Atlanta.
 ,.hile industrial combina tions ant fnan- eial operations have filled the air with their clamorous processes, the hen has scratched along in humble privacy, and she has beaten even the record of King Wheat; for the value of her modest spe. cialty has turned out to be greater than the whole value of the whole wheat crop of twenty-eight states and territories in one year.
 The gold and silver mines of the cour- try arn't worth mentioning in comparison with the simple bird. Only once in fifty years has the value of the gold and sil- yer of the United States beaten the value of it's eggs.
 Figures cannot give any idea of the enormous value of this American citizeu, for the figures are too big to bring de- light or understanding to anyone except a benighted and violent statistician. Fo" instance what does 233 59S, 005 mean? Yet that is the number of chickens of laying age in the United States according to the last census which enumerated them well as the rest of us
 The value of that noble aggregation of laying talent was $7OOCO,0OO.
 A k arveI of Eggs.
 The wonderful flock of birds laid more than one and one-quarter billion dozen Of eggs in one year. This isn't a dream not even that kind of a dream which be- gins "it is estimated For these figures are not "estimated." They are exact statistics collected through the various departments of the government day by day as the eggs were put on the market That would entitle every man, woman and child in the country, from the Pa eihc to the Atlantic, and from Canada to Mexico to 203 eggs in the year. Uncle Sam has figured up not only all the hens of laying age, but all the poul- try of all ages in the country, not scorn- l ing either the broilers or the Methusalehs that pour into the market after a well l Q n he as spring chickens.
 As the result of his count, he finds that l the poultry of the United States numbers more than a quarter of billon-250. .6Sl = 593 to be exact And the value is $S5.S00,- 0o0-enough to give every inhabtant of this country little more than SLIP as his share if they were sold for the ac- count of the public.
 Going back to the hens of egg laying age alone, and leaving out the tender in. fants that are only consumers and mol producers. Uncle Sams men find thai these industrious and non-strikng work ! CTS have produced almost 137 millions oi dollars in the form of marketable pro geny and little more than IA millions of dollars worth of eggs. The exact tota of their production in dollars Is $2S1,17S 247
 And that. on the original valuation ot the plant of $7O,O0OOO0 means that tho American hen has simply knocked into cooked hat the income producing ca. | pacity of trusts. mines manufacturing combinations. Wall street and any except the widest freaks of speculative stock for the income produced by the hen is 4oO per cent on the original investment with a little bagatelle of S1, ,17S,247 left over for pin money.
 1 The Beast and the Hen.
 If person could get a bird d's-eye view of the shipping ports of this country al any day in the year he would see droves of cattle, horses and mules go thunder. l ing up gaugplanks and being hauled in slings up the sides of ships. Steers and | cows by the thousands stream into ships at wharves in Boston, New York and Baltimore. Mules and horses in amending procession day after day go into ships in l all the ports clean around the coast from | Portland. Me. to Galveston, Tex And | still more herds go into still more ships l on the Pacific coast.
 l Criss-crossing each other. north east. west and south. all over the continent, rush trains filled with them not only day after day. but intending through the day and night, with never a Sunday, never | a holiday to give the whrlng wheels and the singing rails a moments rest. l Hogs and sheep, and mules, and cows, and steers. and horses-count them. watch them trampling, rushing to the sea. and then turn to the figures gathered by the census and treasury departments and find that all that jostling. never ceasing stream of great brutes from mil lions of acres of pasture does not amount in value to one-quarter of the value of the iaiI Inv thp 1ittIe hon And If