January 10, 1983

Dear Mr Plant,

To start this new year, I sincerely hope you are having some improvement in your ability to discern the small print as well as the large. I can be sympathetic with you because of my own problems.

From the material you previously submitted to me, I thought both the pea and single comb were in existence on the Australian Pit Game Bantam. However, in view of the statement in your letter of October 4, 1982, I have deleted from the description for the male and female, the pea comb in this breed. Unless I hear further from you, the description will appear hereafter with a single comb only, dubbed as a preference in the male.

With reference to the Australian Australorp, I have no intention to write a separate description for the breed because there appears no significant variation between our description and that furnished me from your work.

I was intrigued by your statement that you intended to write about the indigenous breeds of Australia. I wondered which are breeds which you consider indigenous and how you concluded that they were not transported for other locations. There has been controversy over the last three centuries about the origins of chickens and I will be most interested to hear what you have to say about this.

There will be a marked change in the next Edition of Bantam Standard. The book Bantam Standard will go to press sometime after 1 July 1983. It will contain a canter section of sixteen pages in full color showing the most popular breeds of Bantams in the United States and the associated color patterns. The Bantam Standard will now include all recognized breeds that are actively being raised in the United States and for which advertising is carried in the ABA Yearbook. A second, separate volume will be titled Rare and Foreign Breeds of Bantams and will pick up all breeds and varieties not included in the Bantam Standard.

By the way, I don’t remember your mentioning that you received a copy of the 5th Edition which was dispatched in the mail to you in August 1981. It was a numbered and autographed copy. Did you receive it?

Sincerely,