The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-11-29
PRICE OF EGGS IS SOARING SEWARD Forty Gents on Highlands, Thir- ty-fve Down Town SUPPLY IS DWlNDLING Many of the Eggs Sold Are Bad, But Some Groeers Offer to Replace
 Them If Returned.
 shrdlu
SUPPLY IS OWlNDLING

When you turned over in your bed at daybreak this morning and heard your neighbors' chickens eackling, did you catch that new 4O-cent note which they began using yesterday morning?
 Forty cents a dozen for eggs is what some of the Birmingham grocers started charging yesterday. and when the cus- toner kicked on the price the grocers ad- vised them to kick on the hens. But when the customer approached Mrs. Hen and inquired as to why she had raised the price on her thin shell commodity that old lady simply turned her head sideways, looked at him out of the corner
 of her eye and winled.
 Back to the grocsryman went the GUS toner, but all that could be gotten this time was demand and supply Demand great and supply dwindling at a rapid rate Price going up.
 Eggs 70 cents dozen and Christmas, when eggs are scarcer than at any other time of the year, month away This fact was soon known in the newspaper of flee and the editor at once assigned a re- porter to find out the trouble.
 Finding he could get little satisfaction from the groceryman as to the cause of the trouble and that the only so- lution the dealer offered was supply and demand" the reporter listened to an explanation by Old Man Rooster him self.
 'Old Lady Specky is the cause of the whole trouble.9 he said. She's the belle of the barnyard, you know, and what she says goes I'm not in it beside her. She's been sulking ever since the first of the year, when the demond for egg flips fell off because of the ruling out of the proper spike The old girl was mighty proud of her connection with the egg flip industry and when the demand for them slackened she took it as a per sonal insult
 She brooded over the matter nightly and no amount of coaXing on my part could cheer her up. Finally she hit upon an idea and at 3:4S d. m. of July assem- bled all of the barnyard fowls together and announced that on the coming Thanksgiving there must be a falling off in the laying of eggs. l protested, telling her with tears in my eyes. that our heads would be cut off if the hens failed to produce, but she was hard-headed and refused to listen to reason. Instead, she only said: We'll run the price of fruit cake up all right.
 1.-The Old Lady also scratched message to the wholesale and retail egg handlers association and put them wise to her orders, and instructed them to raise the price to 40 cents on the Saturday follow ing this said Thanksgiving Day. Said she had it in for Birmingham and was going to stick her for 10 cents on the dozen more for the eggs than she was charging her sister cities.
 We've just put that 40-cent price on the people living on South Highlands, but the rest of Greater Birmingham will treating the restaurants nicely, their price ranging from 20 to 30 cents
 An investigation at different stores last night developed the fact that some were charging 30 and 40 cents for eggs. the Accent price being for guaranteed stock while others were charging B cents, all guaranteed As the rooster put 1t:
 ''Guaranteei Tut! Forty cents dozen for guaranteed eggs and half of them bad That's the way we get them. The grocer says if they are not good that he will replace them. but who wants to go digging back to the store with a handful of bad eggs?''