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AN English terrier, despoiled of her litter of puppies, wandered around
quite inconsolable. A brood of ducklings one day attracted her attention.
Notwithstanding their quacks of protest, she seized them in her mouth, bore
them to her kennel, and with the most affectionate anxiety followed them
about, giving them, in her own fashion, a mother's care.
When the ducklings at length took to water, her alarm knew no bounds. "You
dreadful children," her sharp barks seemed to say when they returned to
land, and taking them in her mouth bore them one by one back to safety, as
she thought, to the kennel.
The year following, when again deprived of her puppies, she adopted two
cock-chickens, rearing them with the same care she had bestowed upon the
ducklings. Their voices, however, when they grew older, greatly annoyed
her, and by various means their foster-mother endeavored to stifle their
crowing.
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A hen that had selected an unused manger in which to lay her eggs, and rear
her brood, found that the barn cat had also selected the same place in
which to pass her hours of repose. The hen made no objection to the
presence of Mrs. Tabby, and _vice-verse_, so that a strong frendship in
time grew up between the two.
Things went on very smoothly, the hen placidly sitting on her eggs, while
Mrs. Tabby came and went at will, spending at least half her time beside
her companion as friendly as though she were a sister cat.
Vainly did the hen sit, vainly did she turn her eggs. All the warmth in the
world would not have hatched a chick from the stale eggs beneath her.
Mrs. Tabby, however, had better luck. To the hen's amazement she found
beneath her very nose one morning five squirming furry little creatures
which might have been chicks but were not. Certainly they were young of
some sort, she reflected, and with true motherly instinct she lent her aid
to their proper bringing up.
The kittens thrived, but unfortunately, when still of tender age were
deprived, by death of their mother. All but one of her offspring found
comfortable homes elsewhere, and that one received the devoted attention of
the hen during the whole of that summer.
"To see it going between the house and barn clucking for the kitten," says
Dr. Beadner in _Our Animal Friends_, "was indeed a funny sight, and quite
as remarkable to see the kitten run to her when she made the peculiar call
that chickens understand means something to eat. At night and during the
resting hours of the daytime, kittie would crawl under the warm wings of
her foster mother; and the brooding hen and her nestling kitten were happy
and contented, little dreaming and caring less that they were so far from
being related to each other."
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