Chapter II: Part 2

"I hear what you say," he replied politely (Ganders are often the most polite when they are about to do or say mean things). "I hear what you say, but you cannot expect me to change my mind about what I have seen with my own eyes. It was certainly quite wrong for him to get ready to burn those eggs, and the marking of them was almost as bad. As for this nonsense about the table hatching out Chickens, that is quite absurd. You could not expect a Gander to believe that. It is the sort of thing which Hens believe."

So the Man's friends had to give up talking to the Gander. Even the Geese were not sure that it was all right. "We would like to think so," they often remarked, "but the Gander says it cannot be."

Now the fowls had something new to puzzle them, for the Man spent one sunshiny morning in walking to and fro in the fields which had always been used for a pasture, stopping every now and then to drive a stake. Sometimes he walked with long strides, and then when his Little Girls spoke to him he would shake his head and not answer. Afterward he seemed to be measuring off the ground with a long line of some sort, letting the Little Girls take turns in holding one end of it for him.

After all of the stakes had been driven, the Man harnessed Brownie to the old stone-boat and began to draw large stones from different parts of the farmyard and pasture. He even went along the road and pried out some which had always lain there, right in the way of every team that had to turn aside from the narrow track. All these were drawn over to the stakes and tumbled off on the ground there.

In the afternoon the Farmer from across the road brought a load of lumber, which he left beside the stone and stakes, and then the work began. The Farmer, who was used to building barns and sheds, began to help the Man lay stone for some sort of long, narrow building. For days after that the work went on. Sometimes the two Men worked together, and sometimes the Farmer drove off to town for more lumber, after showing the Man just what to do while he was gone. The Man seemed to learn very easily, and did not have to take out or do over any of his work. That was probably because he listened so carefully when the Farmer was telling him. People always make mistakes, you know, unless they listen carefully to what they are told.

The poultry strolled around and discussed the new building every day. They could not imagine what it was to be. At first, when only the foundation was laid, it looked so long and narrow that the Gander declared it must be for a carriage house. "Don't you see?" he said. "There will be plenty of room for the platform wagon, the light lumber wagon, and the implements. When they are all in, there will be room for the Man to walk along on either side of them and clean them off. It is about the most sensible thing that I have known the Man to do." The Farmer always left his implements out in all kinds of weather, and sometimes one of his wagons stood out in a storm too.

Nobody except the Geese agreed with the Gander, and they would have agreed with him just as quickly if he had said that the building was for Barn Swallows. You see the Gander was always ready to tell what he thought, and as the Geese never even thought of thinking for themselves, it was very easy for them simply to agree with him.

Brown Bess looked at the long lines of stone all neatly set in cement, and said that she would not mind having one end of the building for herself and the Calf. "It would be much snugger than my place in the barn," said she, "although that is all right in warm weather."

Brownie may have known what it was for, because he had a great deal of Horse sense, but if he knew he did not tell. Being the only Horse on the place, and so much larger than any of the other people, he had not made friends very quickly, although everybody liked him as well as they had Bobs.

It was not until the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen saw that the long space was to be divided into many small rooms that she guessed it might be for the poultry themselves. Even then she dared not tell anybody what she thought. "In the first place," she said to herself, "they may prefer to run all over the farm, as they always have done, laying their eggs wherever they can. If any of them feel that way, they won't like it. If they really want a good house to live in, I might better not tell them what I think, for if I should be mistaken they would be disappointed." In all of which she was exactly right. It is much better for people not to tell their guesses to others. There is time enough for the telling of news when one is quite sure of it.

As the work went on, the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen noticed that at each end of the long space there was a sort of scratching-shed with an open front. The distance between these end sheds was filled by two closed pens, two more scratching-sheds, two more pens, and so on. There were doors from one room to another all the way along, big doors such as Men need, and there were little doors from each pen to its scratching-shed just large enough for fowls.

The Barred Plymouth Rock Hen grew more and more sure that her guess was right, and still she said nothing, although she was happy to see how warm and snug the Man was making the pens. "Why," she said to herself, "if he will let me live in that sort of house I will lay eggs for him in the winter." She had hardly got the words out of her bill when the other poultry came up. It was growing late, and they came for a last look at the house before going to roost.

"I declare," said the Gobbler, "I believe that house is for the Hens!"

"Surely not," said the Gander. "You don't mean for the _Hens_, do you?"

"That is what I said," replied the Gobbler, standing his feathers on end and dragging his wings on the ground. "Why not? The Man knows that Turkeys do not care much for houses, else we might have a place in it. I really wouldn't mind staying in a quiet home sometimes, but in pleasant weather my wives will go, and of course I cannot let them walk around the country alone, so that is how I have to spend my days."

The Turkey Hens looked at each other knowingly. They wished that he would leave them and their children quite alone. He was not fond of children, and the year before the Turkey mothers had had dreadful times in trying to keep theirs out of his sight.

"Let us go inside and see what it is like," said the little Speckled Hen, leading the way. Not until they reached the very last pen did they see enough to make them sure that the Gobbler was right. There they found the perches in place, the nest-boxes ready, and a fine feeding-trough just inside the large front window, where they could stand in the sunshine in winter and eat comfortable meals. The Cocks flew up at once to try the perches. "Fine!" said the Shanghai Cock. "Fine! These perches exactly fit my feet. I am glad that he made them large enough. Low, too, so that we cannot hurt ourselves in flying down."

"I like this," said the White Cock. "The perches are all the same height from the floor. I like a low perch, but not if other fowls are above me. Now you larger fellows can't roost any higher than I do. Cock-a-doodle-doo!" It is not strange that he crowed over it, because every night the fowls had been fighting for the highest roosting places, and the strongest were sure to win.

"Nests!" cackled the Hens. "Nests! How pleasant this will be! They are all in a row, so we can visit with each other while we are laying."

"That is a good plan," said the Brown Hen, who really seemed pleased at last. "I am always thinking of things to say when I am laying, and there is hardly ever any other fowl near enough to hear. It has been very annoying."

"I don't care so much about that," said a very sensible White Hen. "I can stand it not to talk for a while. What I want is a warm nest where the rain cannot strike me, and where I shall have quite room enough for my tail."

"That is what we want, too," said three or four others.

"There have always been so many unpleasant things," said the Brown Hen. "I have tried many places. I find a warm one where the wind cannot blow upon me, and usually there is not enough room for my tail. No Hen can lay comfortably in a nest when her tail is pushed to one side. I have tried laying under the currant bushes in warm weather, and there one has all out-of-doors for her tail, but on rainy days one has to change. I do not like changes."

"You do not?" asked the Shanghai Cock. "I thought all fowls liked changes. If you live here in winter, you will be walking from the pen to the scratching-shed half of the time."

"You know very well what I mean," said the Brown Hen. "I like the changes that I like, of course. Any fowl does. What I do not like is the changes that I don't like." She said this in a dignified and truly Hen-like manner, and then she walked off.

"All I hope," said the White Cock, sadly, "is that we shall not be shut up in these places during the summer. One cannot tell what may happen. One must expect the worst. When I see the wire front of the scratching-shed, I fear that we shall be kept in."

"Nonsense!" cried the Shanghai Cock. "Don't be a Goose. The Man has begun to put a wire fence around a great yard outside, and there will be plenty of room to run there if we are to live here. I do not believe that we shall be shut in, in pleasant weather."

"Come," clucked the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen to her brood. "Come with me to the carriage house. It is time all good little Chickens were asleep."

She was very happy over the pleasant things which she had heard said about the Man. Only a truly polite Hen could have kept from saying "I told you so," all this time, but she had shut her bill tightly and kept back the words she wanted to say.

You remember that the Shanghai Cock had always liked the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen, and now he thought she should be told how they had come to feel about her friend, the Man. He was not used to saying pleasant things, but having praised the perches made it a little easier for him. You know saying one kind thing always makes it easier to say another. So he ran after her.

"Er-er! I don't want the Farmer to come back," he said. Then he thought that did not sound quite right and he tried again. "I'm not sorry he went away. I mean I'm glad that the Man came. All of us are now, except the Gander and the White Cock, and you don't really care for them, do you?"

He looked at her lovingly with his round eyes, and the wind waved his drooping tail feathers. The Barred Plymouth Rock Hen thought that she had never seen him look so handsome. "I don't care at all about them," she replied quite honestly, "and I am glad that you and the others like the Man."

She said "you" much more loudly than she said "the others," and the Shanghai Cock must have known what she meant, for he stretched his neck, opened his bill, and gave such a crow as he was never known, before or since, to give at that hour of the day.

The Barred Plymouth Rock Hen went happily to her nest, and stayed awake long after her last Chicken was fast asleep. Even if one is grown-up and the mother of a family, even if one comes of a finer breed than one's neighbors, he cannot be truly happy without their hearty liking. This Hen felt that she had it at last, and that just by doing the thing which she thought right, but which the other poultry had not liked at all at first. It is often so.

THE PEKIN DUCK STEALS A NEST

The Ducks were not much interested in the new poultry-house. To be sure the Hens talked of hardly anything else now, and several had said that they would be glad to lay in the new nest-boxes as soon as they should be lined with hay for them. So the Ducks heard enough about the house, but did not really care for it at all.

"It is too far from the river," said they. "We are quite contented with the old Pig-pen. Since the Hog and her children were taken away and the Man has cleaned it out, we find it an excellent place. There is room for all of us in the little shed where the Hog used to live, and the Man has thrown in straw and fixed good places for egg-laying. Besides, there is no door, and we can go in and out as often as we choose."

That was exactly like the Ducks. They seemed to think that to go where they wished and when they wished was the best part of life. The best part of sleeping in the old Pigpen, they thought, was being able to leave it whenever they chose. They knew perfectly well, if they stopped to think about it, that a Weasel or Rat could get in quite as easily as they, and it was only their luck which had kept them safe so long.

The Ducks were very pleasant people to know. They never worried about anything for more than a few minutes, and had charmingly happy and contented ways. There were only a few of them on the farm, and no two exactly alike in color and size. The Farmer had never paid much attention to them, and the Boy, who bought and kept them for pets, had tired of them so soon that they had been allowed to go wherever they pleased, until they expected always to have their own way.

They took their share of the food thrown out for the poultry, and then went off to the river for the day. During the hot weather they stayed there until after all respectable Hens had gone to roost. Even the Geese left the water long before they did. When they went to sleep, they settled down on the floor and dozed off. "It is much easier than flying up to roosts and then down again," they said. "Find a place you like, and then stay there. We see no reason why people should make such a fuss about going to sleep."

When the Shanghai Cock heard these things, he shook his head until his wattles swung. "That is all very well for the Ducks," said he, "but from the way this Man acts, I think there may be a change coming for them by and by. I notice that things are more different every day."

The Ducks soon began to see that it was different with them. Ducks, you know, are always very careless about where they lay their eggs. Some of these were so old that they seldom laid eggs, only the Pekin Duck and her big friend, the Aylesbury Duck, laid them quite often after the middle of winter. At first the Man looked in the old Pig-pen for them, but after he had looked many days and found only one, he drew a book out of his pocket and read a bit. Then he called the Little Girls to him and talked to them. "I want you to watch each of those white Ducks," said he, "and for every one of their eggs which you find I will give you a penny."

Each morning for some days after that, the two Ducks were followed by two hopeful Little Girls. "I don't mind it so much now," the Pekin Duck said to her friends on the third day, "but at first I didn't know what to do. I would no sooner sit down to lay under a bush or in some cosy corner than a Little Girl would sit on the ground in front and watch me. Then I would move to another place, and she would move too. I must say, however, that they are very good children. The Boy who lived here often threw stones at us. These children never do. I sometimes think there may be as much difference in Boys and Girls as there is in Ducklings."

When the Little Girls tired of watching for eggs to be laid, the Pekin Duck decided to do something she had never tried before. She was the youngest of the flock, and she wanted Ducklings. The older Ducks tried to discourage her. "Have a good time while you can," said the Aylesbury Duck, who was about her age, and thought Ducklings a bother. "I don't want to be troubled with a lot of children."

The old Ducks advised her not to try it. "You think it will be very fine," said they, "but you will find that you cannot go wherever you want to, and do whatever you please with Ducklings tagging along. The sitting alone is enough to tire a Duck out."

"Oh, I think I could stand it," remarked the Pekin Duck, quietly. "Didn't some Duck stand it long enough to hatch me?"

"Hatch you? No indeed," laughed an old Rouen Duck, who could remember quite distinctly things which had happened three years before on the farm from which they had all come to this. "Hatch you? A Shanghai Hen hatched you and half a dozen other Ducklings in a box with hay in it and slats across the front. I remember quite well how cross she became when she thought it time for her Chickens to chip the shell, and they did not chip. She never dreamed that she was sitting on Ducks' eggs, although every Duck on the place knew it and thought it a good joke. She was a stupid thing, or she would have known without being told. Any bright Hen knows that Ducks' eggs are larger, darker, and greasier looking than her own."

The Pekin Duck remembered very little of her life before coming to the farm, so she was glad to hear of it from the old Rouen Duck. "What did my mother do when her eggs didn't hatch?" said she.

"Do?" repeated the Rouen Duck. "Do? Why she did the only thing that any sitting fowl can do. She kept on sitting."

"How long?" asked the Pekin Duck.

"You don't suppose I can remember that, do you?" replied the Rouen Duck, twitching her little pointed tail from side to side. "Besides, I never count things. All I know is that she said one of the Cocks, who was a friend of hers, declared that the moon was quite new when she began sitting, and that she sat there until it was quite new again. He was roosting in a tree just then, and knew more about the moon because he always awakened to crow during the night. She thought it was dreadful to have to sit so long."

The Pekin Duck saw that the Rouen Duck was still trying to discourage her. "I suppose it was harder for her because her legs were longer," she said. "If they were longer they would ache more, wouldn't they?"

The Rouen Duck smiled all around her bill "Your mother had her worst time later on, though," she said. "When you and your brothers and sisters were hatched, she could not understand why you were so different from all the other children she had ever raised. She said that not one of you looked like her family, and the Shanghai Cock was very disagreeable to her about it. He said she should be more careful whose eggs she hatched. And when you children went into the water, your mother would walk up and down the bank of the pond, clucking as hard as she could, and begging you to come ashore at once. At night, too, there was trouble, for you would never go to bed as early as she thought proper. After a while she learned to march off at a time that suited her, and let you come when you were ready."

"Thank you ever so much for telling me," said the Pekin Duck, sweetly. "It must be horrid to have the wrong kind of children. I promise you that I will not sit on Hens' eggs." Then she waddled away.

"I want some Ducklings," said she, putting her pretty webbed feet down somewhat harder than usual. "I want Ducklings, and I am going to steal a nest at once." She was a Duck of determination, and made a start by finding a cosy spot under some burdock plants and laying an egg before she went in swimming. She was in such haste to make a beginning that she had actually to come back later to finish her nest, which she did by adding more dried leaves and grass and lining it with down which she plucked from her breast.

After that, of course, all her friends knew that it was useless to talk to her about it, for when a Duck goes around at that season of the year with her breast all ragged from her plucking it, people may be very sure that she is planning to hatch a brood. It is not at all becoming, but it is a great help, for when the sitting Duck is tired or hungry, she can pull the down over the eggs and leave her nest, knowing that the down will keep them warm for a long time.

Of course the other Ducks talked about her a good deal when she was not around, and said she would be sorry she had undertaken all that work and care, and that it was exactly as well to drop one's eggs anywhere and let the Man pick them up to put under some sitting Hen. "Yes," said the Aylesbury Duck, "or else give them to the fat table for hatching." Then they all laughed. It seemed such a joke to them that a table should take to hatching eggs.

Nearly every day the Pekin Duck laid an egg, and she soon had enough to begin sitting. After that, she did not go up to the Pig-pen at night with her friends. It was quite lonely in the clump of burdocks, and if the Pekin Duck had been at all timid she might have had some bad nights, for Weasels, Rats, and Skunks were out after dark, looking for something to eat. Yet they must always have found food before they reached the burdocks, for the Duck was not disturbed. During the day her friends came along for a chat, and often the Drake waddled up for a visit. He seemed to think her a very sensible sort of Duck. He had not the Gobbler's dislike of children, although he never shared the labor of hatching them, like his friend the Gander. He thought one could be a good father without going quite as far as that.

The days were long and the nights seemed longer to the tired Pekin Duck, but her courage never failed. When her legs cramped so that she could hardly step off the nest, she smiled and said to herself, "Suppose I were a Thousand-Legged Worm!" She fancied it made her feel better to think of such things, and she never remembered that Thousand-Legged-Worms do not sit on nests and hatch out their children in that way. It is probably better that she did not. If it does one good to think of Thousand-Legged-Worms, it is wise to think about them, even if one does make a slight mistake of this sort.

When the rain came, the burdock leaves kept off most of it, and the few drops which fell between the leaves rolled off the Duck's back without wetting her at all. That was because her feathers were so oily that the rain could not stay on them. Ducks, you know, always have on their water-proofs, and can slip in and out of the water at any time without getting really wet.

The pleasure which she missed most was seeing the changes which the Man was making in the upper end of the pasture. The Drake told her how great yards had been fenced in with wire netting, and how the fronts of the scratching-shed had been covered with somewhat finer netting of the same kind. "Not even a Weasel could get through it," he said. And then the Pekin Duck wished that the Man would fix a place for her Ducklings where Weasels could not get them. She had never feared such creatures for herself, but when she thought of her children she was afraid. That is always the way, since it is much easier for a mother to be brave for herself than for her children.

On a beautiful morning in the last of May, the Pekin Duck was repaid for all her patience and courage by having seven beautiful Ducklings chip the shell. They were even more beautiful than she had thought they would be, and she could not understand why her friends seemed no more impressed. To be sure they said that they were fine Ducklings and that they looked like their mother, and admired their dainty little webbed feet and their bills. They spoke of the beautiful thick down which covered them, and said that they were remarkably bright and strong for their age. And yet the Pekin Duck could see that they had not properly realized what wonderful creatures the Ducklings were.

It was when all the Ducks were gathered around to look at the Ducklings that one of the Little Girls came along with her doll. When she also saw the Ducklings, she was so excited that she hugged her doll tightly to her heart and ran off to find her father.

A few minutes later the Pekin Duck saw her precious babies lifted into a well-lined basket and carried off toward the house. She followed, quacking anxiously, and keeping as close to the Man as possible. Twice he lowered the basket to let her see that her children were quite safe.

The Man carried the basket to a place beside the new poultry-house, now all done, and quickly fixed the old down-lined nest, which the Little Girl had been carrying in another basket, into a fine coop. Next he put the nestlings into it and let the Pekin Duck cover them with her wings. He stretched fine wire netting across the front of the coop, and then the Pekin Duck was perfectly happy. Indeed it was not until the middle of the following night that she remembered she had not looked at the poultry-house at all.

It was rather disappointing not to be able to take her children in swimming for two days, but when she saw how carefully the Man fed them on bread and milk and other soft food, and how particular he was about having plenty of clean water for them to drink, she quite forgave him for keeping them there. The other Ducks came to tell her how to care for the Ducklings, to shake their sleek heads, and to tell her how unfortunate it was that she could not take the Ducklings in swimming at once. "You will need to know many things," said the old Rouen Duck, "and I will tell you if you will come to me every time that you are perplexed."

"Thank you," said the Pekin Duck. But she never went. She thought it just as well that a Duck who had never hatched out children should not be giving advice to people who had.

When the Ducklings were three days old, they were let out and started at once for the river. When their mother had to stop to speak to her friends on the way, they did not wait for her, but marched on ahead. All the fowls spoke admiringly of them, and the Pekin Duck was truly happy as she looked at her seven proper little Ducklings.

They were such bright children, too, waddling right down to the edge of the brook and slipping in without a single question as to how it should be done. Their mother followed after and showed them how she fed from the bottom, reaching her head far down until she could fill her orange-colored bill with the soft mud from the bottom. There were many tiny creatures in the mud which were good to eat, and these she kept and swallowed, letting the mud pass out between the rough edges of her bill. If the water had been deeper, she could have showed them how she dived, staying long under water and coming up in a most unexpected place.

When they came out of the water and stood on the bank, their mother stretched herself up as tall as she could and preened her feathers. The seven little Ducklings stood as tall as they could and squeezed the water out of their down with their tiny bills, which seemed so much longer for them than their mother's did for her.

The Pekin Duck was much amused to see how the other Ducks flocked around her children. Indeed, she laughed outright once, when she heard the old Rouen Duck say to the White Cock, "Don't you think that our Ducklings are growing finely?"

Of course the Pekin Duck was ashamed of having laughed at any one so much older than she, so she stuck her head under her wing and pretended to be arranging the feathers there. When she drew it out again she was quite sober, but she was thinking "Our Ducklings! Our Ducklings! They may all call them that if it makes them happy to do so, but really they are my Ducklings, for I earned them, and they love me as they love nobody else."

THE NEW NESTS AND THE NEST EGGS

As might have been expected, the new poultry-house was no sooner finished than the fowls began to discuss who should live in the different parts. They could see no reason why they should not all run together, as they always had done. "Perhaps," the Black Hen had said, "the Man may put us all together and let the table's Chickens have pens to themselves."

"What?" said the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen, "put me in one pen and my Chickens in another? That would never do."

"You forget," said the Shanghai Cock very gently, "that by winter-time they will not need your care any more, and you will not wish to be with them so much." And that was true, for no matter how fond a Hen may be of her tiny Chickens, she is certain to care less for them when they are grown.

All the fowls were quite sure that they should have the best pen and yard, because they had been the longest on the place. After they had spoken of that, they had a great time in deciding which was the best pen. Part of the fowls wanted to be in the end toward the road, so that they could see all that went on there and look across to the other farm to watch their neighbors. The Cocks all preferred this. They liked excitement.

Some of the Hens wished to live in the pen next to the barn. "We are fond of the barn," they said. "We have been there so much, and have laid so many eggs there that it seems like home. We know that it is not so comfortable, but it seems like home."

However, the Cocks had their wish, and on the day when it was granted there was such a crowing from fence-tops as greatly puzzled the Man. He could not find anything in his books and papers to explain it, although he looked and looked and looked. At last one of the Little Girls told him what she thought, and she was exactly right. "It sounds to me as though they were just happy," she said. You see the Man had not lived long enough on a farm to understand the language of poultry very well, so he had much to learn. There are many people who think themselves quite wise and yet cannot tell what one of a tiny Chicken's five calls means, and there are some Men, even some fathers (and fathers need to know more than anybody else in the world, except mothers) who do not know that a Cock can say at least nine different things with the same cry, "Cock-a-doodle-doo!"

This Man was a father and had been a school-teacher, too, so he was not an ignorant Man, and after his Little Girl said that he decided to learn poultry-talk. It took some weeks, but you shall hear by and by how well he succeeded.

The Man wanted to teach the Hens to lay in the new nests, so that he would not have to spend much time in egg-hunting, and because he wished to be sure of finding the eggs as soon as they were laid. People should grow good as they grow old, you know, but it is not so with the eggs. The Man did not want to shut the fowls in during the warm weather, for then he would have to feed them more, and that would cost too much money, yet he opened this front pen with its scratching-shed and yard, and fed them there every night. While they were feeding he closed the outer gate, so that they could not go back to roost on the trees or wherever they chose. The perches were comfortable, with room enough for all, and far enough apart so that those in the back rows did not have their bills brushed by the tails of those in front.

The Hens who had Chickens were now kept in the second pen from this, and so were quite safe from prowling Weasels and other hunters. In the front pen, you see, there were only full-grown fowls, and morning was a busy time for most of the laying Hens. The gate was not opened until the sun was well up, and by that time many of the Hens had laid in one of the cosy nests under the perches, nests which were so well roofed over that not even a pin-feather could have dropped into them from above. They were so very comfortable that even the Hens who did not lay before leaving the pen were soon glad to come strolling back to it, instead of fluttering and scrambling to some lonely corner of the hayloft in the barn.

On the first morning that the fowls were shut in there, a very queer thing happened. The first Hen to go on a nest exclaimed, "Why, who was here ahead of me?"

Nobody answered, and the Hen asked again.

At last the Speckled Hen said, "I think you are the first one to lay this morning."

"The first one!" exclaimed the Black Hen, for it was she, as she backed out onto the floor again. "You must not expect me to believe that I am the first when there is an egg in the nest already." As she spoke she pointed in with her bill, and the others came crowding around.

There lay a fine, large, and quite shiny egg. While they were still looking and wondering which Hen had laid it, the Brown Hen discovered that there was an egg in each of the six other nests. She was so excited that for a minute she could hardly cackle. The Black Hen began to look angry, and stood her feathers on end and shook herself in a way that she had when she was much displeased. She was not a good-natured Hen.

"You think that you are very smart," she said, "but _I_ think that you are very silly. Every fowl here knows that I always like to be the first on the nest in the morning, and yet seven of you must have laid in the night to get ahead of me. I don't mind having an egg in the nest. Every Hen likes to find at least one there. It is the mean way in which you tried to prevent my getting ahead of the rest of you."

The Hens insisted that they never took their feet from the perches all night long, and the Speckled Hen, who was a very kind little person, tried to show the Black Hen that it was all a mistake of some sort. "Perhaps they were laid in there yesterday," said she, "only we did not notice them when we came in."

The Cocks kept still, although they looked very knowing. They did not want to offend any of the Hens by taking sides. At last the Brown Hen spoke. It always seemed that she made some trouble every time she opened her bill. "I remember," said she, "that there was not an egg there when I went to roost last night. The last thing I did before flying up onto my perch was to look in all the nests and try to decide which I preferred."

Then there was more trouble, and in the midst of it the Speckled Hen hopped into one of the nests. "Sorry to get ahead of you," she said politely to the Black Hen, "but the truth is that I feel like laying." She gave a little squawk as she brushed against the egg there. "It is light!" she cried. "It is light and slippery! None of us ever laid such an egg as that."

"Of course not," said one of the Cocks, who now saw his way to stop the trouble. "Of course none of you lay that sort of eggs. I could have told you that long ago, if you had asked me."

When the fowls were all looking at each other and wondering what sort of creature it could be who had slipped in and laid the eggs there, a tiny door in the outside wall, just back of one of the nests, was opened, and the Man peeped in. All he saw was a number of fowls standing around and looking as though they had been very much surprised. Half of the Hens stood with one foot in the air. He dropped the door, which was hinged at the top, and then the fowls looked at each other again. It was a great comfort to them at times like these to be able to look both ways at once. "The Man opened those little doors while we were asleep, and put those eggs in," they said. "They are not Hens' eggs at all. Probably they are some that his table laid."

It was only a minute before all the nests were in use, and soon the noise of puzzled and even angry clucking was replaced by the joyous cackling of Hens who felt that they had done their work for the day. "Of course," said the Speckled Hen, "those eggs cannot be so good as the ones we lay, but I do not mind the feeling of them at all. And I must say that finding them already in a strange nest makes it seem much more homelike to me. This Man acts as though he really understood Hens and wanted to make them happy."

THE WHITE PLYMOUTH ROCKS COME

Only a few days after the new poultry-house had been opened to the fowls on the place, the Man came home from town with a crate in his light wagon. In the crate were a Cock and ten Hens. All were very beautiful White Plymouth Rocks, and larger than any of the fowls on the place would have supposed possible. You can imagine what a scurrying to and fro there was among those who had always lived on the place, and how many questions they asked of each other, questions which nobody was able to answer.

"Are they to live on this farm?" said one.

"It must be so," answered another. "Don't you see that the Man is getting ready to open the crate?"

"Where do you suppose they came from?" asked a third. "Why, they are almost as big as Turkeys."

"Altogether too large, I think," said a Bantam. "It makes fowls look coarse to be so overgrown."

"What is that?" asked the Shanghai Cock, sharply. He had come up from behind without the Bantam's seeing him, and she hardly knew what to answer. She lowered her head and pecked at the ground, because she did not know what to say. She dared not tell the Shanghai Cock, who was very tall, that she thought large fowls looked coarse. So she kept still. It would have been much better if she had held up her head and told the truth, which was that she disliked to have large fowls around, since it made her seem smaller.

"I think," said the Shanghai Cock, "that if a fowl is good, the more there is of him the better. If he is not good, the smaller he is the better." He looked over towards the wagon as he spoke, but the Bantam knew that he meant her, and then she was even more uncomfortable. She thought people were all looking at her, and she felt smaller than ever.

The Man backed the wagon up to the outer gate of the second poultry-yard, which was just between the one where the Chickens were with their mothers and the one into which the older fowls were allowed to go. Then he loosened the side of the crate very carefully and took the new-comers out, one at a time. He had to hold the side of the crate with his hand, so the only way in which he could lift the fowls out was by taking them by the legs in his other hand and putting them, head downward, into the yard. One would think that it might be quite annoying to a fowl to have to enter his new home in that fashion, with all the others watching, but the White Plymouth Rocks did not seem to mind it in the least. Perhaps that was because they had been carried so before and were used to it. Perhaps, too, it was because they felt sure that the fowls who were standing around had also been carried by the legs. Perhaps it was just because they were exceedingly sensible fowls and knew that such things did not matter in the least. At all events, each Hen gave herself a good shake when allowed to go free, settled her feathers quickly, and began to walk around. The Cock did the same, only he crowed and crowed and crowed, as much as to say, "How fine it is to be able to stretch once more! A fellow could not get room to crow properly in that crate."

Now everybody knows that the poultry who had been long on the place should have spoken pleasantly to the White Plymouth Rocks at once. It would have made them much happier and would have been the kind thing to do. They did not do it, and there were different reasons for this. The Shanghai Cock was so used to saying disagreeable things every day to the fowls whom he knew, that now, when he really wanted very much to be agreeable, he found he did not know how. There are many people in the world who have that trouble. The Bantam Hen was cross, and walked away, saying to herself, "I guess they are big enough to take care of themselves." And that was a mistake, as you very well know, for nobody in this world is big enough to be perfectly happy without the kindness and friendship of others.

As for the rest of the fowls, some of them didn't care about being polite; some of them didn't know what was the best thing to say and so did not say anything; and some thought it would not do to talk to them, because they were not so large and fine-looking as the White Plymouth Rocks. They really wanted to do the kind thing, but were afraid they did not look well enough. As though kindness were not a great deal more important than the sort of feathers one wears!

The White Plymouth Rocks did the best that they could about it. They chatted pleasantly among themselves, saying that it was a fine day, and that it seemed good to set foot on grass once more, and that they had sadly missed having a bit of grass to eat with their grain and water while they were in the crate.

It was at this time that the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen in the next yard came over to the wire netting which separated the two. She would have come sooner if it had not been for her Chickens. Two of them had been quarrelling over a fat bug which they found, and she stayed to settle the trouble and scold them as they deserved. Now she came stepping forward in her very best manner to greet the strangers. She knew that she was not so large as they, and that her barred gray feathers were not nearly so showy as their gleaming white ones, but she also knew that somebody should welcome them to the farm, and she was ashamed that it had not been done sooner.

"Good-morning," said she. "I am very glad that you have come here to live."

"Oh, thank you," replied all the White Plymouth Rocks together. "We are very glad to meet you. We hope to be happy here."

"Have you come far?" asked the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen.

"Very far," said they. "Unless you have taken such a journey you can have no idea how glad we are to be free again."

"I have never taken any journey," said she, "except the time I came here to live, and that was when I was only a Chicken. I do not remember much about it. I fluttered out of a crate that was being carried in a wagon, and ran around alone until I happened to find this place."

"How sad!" exclaimed the Cock. "I hope you have had no such hard time since. They seem to have a good poultry-house here, although I have not yet been inside."

"It is a good one," said the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen, "but I do not sleep in it these warm nights. I stay in a coop in my yard with my children." As she spoke she looked lovingly down at the white flock around her feet. They were growing finely and already showed some small feathers on their wings.

"Oh!" exclaimed the Hens in the other yard. "Oh, what beautiful Chickens! So strong! So quick! So well-behaved! How long is it since you hatched them?"

"Well," replied their mother, "I suppose I did not hatch them. I sat long enough on the nest and laid enough eggs, but the Man who owns the farm took away my eggs and brought me these Chickens. He has a sort of table down in his cellar which hatches out all the Chickens on the farm. I might just as well have saved myself all those tiresome days and nights of sitting if I had known how it would be."

"That is a good thing to know," said one of the new-comers. "On the farm from which we came, all the Chickens are hatched in that way. We never had a mother who was alive."

"Not until after you were hatched I suppose," remarked the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen, who thought the other did not mean exactly what she had said.

"We had no real mother then," said the White Plymouth Rock Hen. "There were so many of us that we had to get along without. The Man who owned us had a lot of things to take the place of mothers. They were made of wood and some soft stuff and he used to set them around in the yards on pleasant days. We ate the food and drank the water that were brought to us, and then we played around in the grass near the make-believe mothers. When we were tired or cold we crawled under them and cuddled down, and when we were scared we did the same way. We were very well cared for by the Men, and we all grew to be strong and healthy fowls, but I sometimes wish that we could have had a live mother to snuggle under and to love."

The Barred Plymouth Rock Hen was greatly surprised. "I think it is well to save the Hens having to hatch out the broods," she said, "but they should be willing to care for the Chickens. There is nothing quite so good as a live mother."

Another Plymouth Rock Hen strolled up. "I have been in the pen and the scratching-shed," said she, "and I think them delightful."

"Are they at all like what you had before coming here?" asked the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen.

"Very much the same," was the reply. "Only on the farm from which we came there were a great, great many more pens. It took four Men to care for us all. Most of us were White Plymouth Rocks. What are those fowls outside? We never saw any that looked just like them."

"Oh," replied the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen with a little smile, "they don't know exactly what they are. The Shanghai Cock is a Shanghai, as any one can tell by looking at his long and feathery legs, but he and I are the only ones who belong to fine families. He is really an excellent fellow, although, of course, being a Shanghai is not being a Plymouth Rock."

"Of course not," agreed all the new fowls, speaking quite together. "We understand perfectly. You mean that he is a very good Shanghai."

"Exactly," said the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen. "The other fowls think him rather cross, but he never has been cross to me. I think he gets tired of hearing some of them quarrel and fuss, and then he speaks right out."

"One has to at times," said the Cock, politely, for he saw that the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen wished him to like her friends. "When you can," he added, "tell him that I would like to meet him. I suppose we shall not be allowed to go out of our own yard, but he can come up to the fence. And send the others also. We would like to meet our new neighbors."

"I will," replied the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen, as she clucked to her Chickens. "Good-by. I see that we have fresh food coming."

While her children were feeding she pretended to eat, pecking every now and then at the food, and chatting softly with them as they ate. There was always much to say about their manners at such times, and she had to use both of her eyes to make sure that they did not trample on the food. She also had to remind them often about wiping their bills on the grass when they had finished. She could not bear to see a Chicken running around with mush on the sides of his bill.

When they had eaten all they wished and ran away to play, she ate what was left and sat down to think. "I would like to be white," she said to herself. "I would certainly like to be white, and live in style with those fowls who have just come. It must be lovely to be so important that one is taken riding on the cars and lifted around carefully in crates."

Then she remembered how they had spoken of their legs aching, and how glad they were to be free on the grass once more. "I don't know that I would really care about travelling," she added, "but I would like to live in such style with a lot of fowls of my own family."

She remembered what the Cock had said about their having to stay in their own yard, and she added, "But I would not want to have to stay always in the same place."