He was a noble looking fowl, that rooster, and challenged my admiration
by his unusual proportions, glossy plumage, and proud, exultant air.
As I paused in my walk to view him his sharp eyes were instantly
fastened upon mine and a note of warning issued from his handsome
throat. Away scampered the hens and young chicks, but the rooster,
advancing a pace or two, lifted one foot menacingly, as if to defy my
taking one step further.
"Dear, dear!" I exclaimed, "you make a great fuss over nothing. I only
stopped to admire you and your family. Be assured I meant you no harm."
"_Gluck, gluck, gluck_," replied he angrily.
The spectacle of a champion standing on one leg and sending forth such
a cry of defiance struck me as so ridiculous that I involuntarily burst
into laughter.
Every fowl in the inclosure at the sound stood motionless.
"What was that?" questioned one motherly old hen of another.
It was a queer gibberish which she spoke, and most people would have
failed to understand it, but to me--who had been listening to the
voices of nature the whole day long, to whom the trees had whispered
their secrets, the brooks had murmured their complaints, the birds had
caroled their stories--to me the language of these feathered creatures
was perfectly intelligible.
"I don't know, I'm sure," replied the other, "but somehow it sounded
rather pleasant."
"Pleasant!" exclaimed a young white and buff hen, tossing her pretty
head, "it appeared to me she was making fun of us."
"Will you be quiet, you cackling old hens?" roared Mr. Rooster, giving
them a swift glance from one eye, while furtively watching me with
the other. "What business is it of yours what the intentions of this
intrusive person may be? I am the one to decide that question. What do
females know about war, anyway, especially hens? If she means fight,
why----"
"You'll run, no doubt, and hide behind your wives," I interrupted,
feeling the old fellow to be a boaster. "I've a notion to scale the
fence and see," I added mischievously.
He stepped back a pace or two in evident alarm.
"Never fear," I hastened to say. "Only cowardly hearts find pleasure in
giving pain to innocent and defenseless creatures. My only object in
stopping was to view your happy family and--and--in fact, Mr. Rooster,
to interview yourself."
"Interview me?" he exclaimed. "Well, I never!" and filled with a sense
of his importance the old fellow set up such a crowing that even a
Jersey cow, munching grass by the wayside, paused to ruminate over what
it might mean.
"A reporter," sneered the ill-natured young hen. "A woman reporter! How
unnatural!"
"Louisa Mercedes," sharply cried the rooster, "how many times have I
told you to bridle your tongue?"
"I'm not a horse," sulkily replied Louisa, "and what's more, I
think if you would bridle your vanity it would be much more to your
advantage. You want to do all the talking--and eating, too," she added
in an undertone.
"She's but a young thing," loftily said Mr. Rooster, "and I have to
overlook much of her insolence, you know. Another year will find her
less spirited, like Georgiana and Marthena and Sukey over there. But
let us resume our conversation. About what do you want to interview me?"
"First, I should like to know--why, do you intend to come out?" I
interrupted as he moved nearer the fence.
"Oh, no; but it's just as well that the women folks don't hear all we
have to say. They have such a disagreeable fashion of contradicting,
you know, and such good memories, that when you're least expecting
it up they'll drag some remark made months ago to clinch an argument
against you. Females are such queer creatures--but I beg your pardon,"
he added apologetically, remembering my sex. "I forgot."
"How many wives have you?" I queried, beginning the interview.
"Well," marking with his claws in the sand as he named over Louisa
Mercedes, Cassie, Maud, and a number of others. "I have, as near as I
can figure it, about nine now."
"Now?" I repeated.
"Yes. I had more the first of the season, but the folks up at the house
have the habit of coming through that door in the barn yonder when
the minister comes to dinner and carrying off any member of my family
which strikes their fancy. I don't know what they do with them, I am
sure, but presently I hear a dreadful squawk or two in the woodshed, a
flouncing around, and then all is still. It is very painful, I assure
you," and Mr. Rooster, lifting one foot, pretended to wipe a tear from
his sharp, dry eyes.
"You defend them, of course," I responded, endeavoring to appear solemn.
"Of course," swaggered the husband and father, "and sometimes I crow as
loud as I can for an hour or so afterward."
"Crow?"
"Yes, to let the folks know _I'm_ not conquered."
"Haven't you," I asked, to hide my mirth, "a preference for some of
your wives over others?"
Mr. Rooster gravely surveyed his household.
"No," he said reflectively, "no, I can't say that I have."
"But that white one," I said, "over yonder. She is so handsome."
"Maud, that white and silver Wyandotte, you mean. H'm, yes. She's _too_
handsome. I have a great deal of trouble with her."
"Trouble--how?"
"Oh, in various ways," with a frown. "She is too pretty to work, she
thinks, and spends half her time in preening her feathers, polishing
her toe nails, or, what's worse, staring through the fence over yonder
at that proud, long-legged Mr. Shanghai. He's a foreign bird, you know,
and thinks himself a deal better than a common American Plymouth Rock.
There's going to be trouble between us yet, mark my words."
"You have no trouble, I suppose with the older ones," I returned,
suppressing a smile.
"No, not in that way, ma'am. They quarrel a good deal about their
children, however. Sukey--that brown and white Leghorn over
there--thinks her children are veritable little angels with wings, and
Georgiana--an out-and-out Plymouth Rock like myself--says they are
little demons, her own brood being the little angels, you perceive.
Twenty times a day I have to chastise the whole lot, mothers and all.
Indeed," with a sigh, "I have a notion to turn them all out some day,
just to have peace. All, except Jennie, the black Langshan. She's old
to be sure, but a great comfort to me."
"Of course, of course," sneered a voice behind him. "Precious little
spunk has Jennie, scratching around from morning till night that she
may turn up a bug or worm for a lazy old curmudgeon like you. So you
intend to turn me out on the cold, cold world some day, do you? Hm!
we'll see about that."
"That's Jane," grinned Mr. Rooster, without turning around, "I hope
they will choose her the next time they want one of my household, I
really do."
"Oh, yes," sneered Jane, "you'll run away and squawk as you always do,
and leave me to my fate."
"Run away," screamed Mr. Rooster making a dash for her, "I run away!"
"Fie, fie," I exclaimed, "you musn't show your valor by striking one of
the weaker sex. You were intended to be her protector, you know."
I was here interrupted by a great commotion among the hens and chicks
at the farther end of the enclosure.
"Only a quarrel, I presume," said he indifferently, "they can settle it
among themselves, to-day."
"No, it seems to be something rather serious," I responded, and as I
spoke a large cat succeeded in squeezing herself through the palings.
Wildly ran the fowls about, cackling with fear.
"Hubby, hubby!" cried the hens.
"Papa, papa!" screamed the chicks.
"Run for your lives," admonished that hero, his knees knocking
together, his comb and tail drooping, "run for your lives," and
suiting the action to the word; away he scurried to the other side,
and spreading his wings over the fence he flew, in his blind flight
dropping at the feet of his hostile neighbor.
"Get out of here," screamed the young Shanghai, whom the handsome hen
admired, "How dare you come over in my yard?"
"Give me time," meekly said my heroic Rooster, "give me time to gain my
breath and I will."
"Now is my time," thought the young Shanghai, "the very chance I have
been looking for," and straightway into the trembling Mr. Rooster he
pitched.
From my standpoint I closely viewed the battle.
"Lo, the conquered braggart comes," I hummed, as a woebegone-looking
object in a very little while dropped wearily over into our enclosure
again.
"My poor dear," pityingly cried old Jennie. "Come, Sukey, let's lead
him to the trough and bathe his wounded head."
I was about to depart, my heart wrung with compassion at the sight of
his wounds, when, lifting his drooping head, with a ghastly wink of his
uninjured eye, he said:
"Well!"
"Well!" I echoed in some surprise.
"Didn't I play that trick cleverly?" he asked with a sickly grin.
"Trick?"
"Yes, trick, you stupid! Couldn't you see the pretense I made of
running away from the cat, just to get a chance of flying over the
fence to get at that impudent Shanghai rooster?"
"But," I gasped, "you didn't whip him, you know."
"Didn't whip him!" he mimicked with brazen effrontery. "Why, how else,
I'd like to know, could I have been torn up so? All I want now is a
chance at that sneaking cat, and I'll make the fur fly, I warrant you."
Here the old deceiver, overcome with weakness and loss of blood,
staggered, and would have fallen but for the Support of the faithful
Jennie and Sukey.
"Go away," hoarsely muttered the rooster, "go away; what do females
know about war. They can't crow! Go away!"