Her reply was "Pshaw!" (She really does say "Pshaw"--and means it.)
"Pshaw! they will live on kitchen scraps."
We consulted Nibletts. He has a local reputation as a chicken expert,
mainly, I believe, because he's a butcher. He recommended a breed
called Wild Oats (by which he meant, I discovered, Wyandottes).
"You take my tip, Sir," he said, "and buy Wild Oats. If you'll excuse
the word--" (Nibletts is always apologising for some term he is about
to use, which promises to be inexpressibly shocking to polite ears,
and never is)--"they're clinkers."
We ordered a round dozen. We also bought a hen-house fitted with all
modern conveniences. The total outlay represented a prince's ransom;
but, as I pointed out to my aunt, we had a run for our money.
The hens, when they arrived, were not strictly "as per" advertisement.
We bought them as laying pullets, and they didn't lay for quite a
time--so far as we knew. Nibletts, however, declared that they were
"what you might call in the pink," and surmised that the train journey
had "put 'em off the lay, as you might say." If eating and fighting
were evidences of their being "in the pink," those birds must have
enjoyed exceptional health. They also slept well, I believe.
After about a month one enormous egg arrived--an egg that would not
have disgraced a young ostrich. Its huge dimensions worried my aunt.
She wondered if they were a symptom, and consulted Nibletts.
He put it down to the food. He said that kitchen scraps were "no good
for laying pullets." "That egg, lady," he said, "is what us fanciers
call--excuse me--" (I saw my aunt shudder in anticipation)--"a
bloomer. You must give 'em a lot more meal."
We bought a big sack of meal--through the medium of Nibletts. If I
remember rightly it cost rather more than the pullets.
Still no eggs. Then some of the hens went out of "the pink." For
instance, one developed a chronic habit of running centripetally
round a constantly diminishing circle, fainting on arriving at
the geometrical centre. My distressed aunt called in Nibletts to
prescribe. There was only one word for it--that awful word "staggers."
There was only one cure for it--death. Should he wring its neck?
We feelingly withdrew, and he did it. He took the corpse away with
him, so that he presumably had a use for it.
Soon a second pullet went down with a considerably swollen face. My
aunt bathed it twice a day in a hot anti-septic, but to no purpose,
except that the poor thing seemed much comforted by the fomentation.
That hen was, Nibletts whispered to me, for fear my aunt should
overhear, "a waster." The only thing to do was to coop it up from the
rest, or they'd all go down with it--whatever it was.
We cooped it up till it died. Nibletts certified the cause of death as
that unmentionable complaint, the pip.
Still no eggs, notwithstanding repeated appeals in the sacred name of
_Macduff_. We did, however, find out what the trouble was.
The hens were eating the eggs!
Nibletts said--under his breath--that they were what was known as
"blighters." He recommended (deprecating the term) a "stodger." A
"stodger" proved to be an egg-shell stuffed with bread-crumbs, mustard
and the strongest photographic ammonia.
My aunt said it would be cruel. It was certainly rough on me. Nibletts
apologetically directed me to blow an egg--"a shop 'un 'd do."
Accordingly, following his instructions, I injected or otherwise
introduced the ingredients through a small aperture. It was the
bread-crumbs that gave me most trouble; but it was the photographic
ammonia that was "cruel." The mustard went in quite easily with a
squirt.
I stopped the holes with paper stuck on with sealing-wax and put
the _oeuf farci_ in the run. I waited to see what would happen. It
happened at once. All ten hens went for that egg in a convergent
attack, and all ten pecks got home simultaneously. The deputation then
hurriedly withdrew, with loud protests, and spent the rest of the day
wiping their beaks in the cool earth.
But they remained recalcitrant. They systematically cannibalized. A
cackle from the layer brought all the rest to the spot; and I simply
couldn't stay there all day to forestall the onslaught.
Nibletts suggested our getting a patent laying-box, furnished with
(what he apologised to my aunt for calling) a false front. My aunt did
not at first grasp the idea, but what Nibletts did in fact refer
to was a contrivance that would admit one sitter only at a time,
subsequent unauthorised entrance being cut off by an ingenious drop
slide. Further elaborate construction also prevented the sitter
herself from turning round to peck. She had to remain sitting till
some human came and lifted her out.
Just one egg was laid in that patent box. The object of it was also
patent--to the hens. Nothing would induce them to use it after that
once.
Nibletts then recommended (if he might so describe it) a "tit-up."
That was, so to speak, a conjuring-trick of a laying-box, which let
the egg fall through a trap-door into a padded cell beneath. My
aunt thought it unnatural and feared that it might be exhausting.
Nevertheless we tried it, and extracted one solitary egg from the
basement.
Then, being an engineer by profession, I conceived a mechanical means
of giving those hens the scare of their lives if they persisted
in their antisocial habits. I constructed a "spoof" egg of white
enamelled metal, with hinges that opened when a catch was touched.
Inside I compressed one of those jack-in-the-box snakes that spring
out when free to do so.
It was quite effective--as a parlour-trick. Those hens pecked the
catch loose, and that cockatrice fairly staggered them. It was to them
a clear case of "nourishing a viper." But all was as before.
Nibletts then gave up the case as (what he might be excused for
calling) a "fair corker." Should he wring their (pause) necks?
We thought it best so, and gave him a couple of "laying pullets" for
his trouble. The other eight kept us going monotonously for about a
month.
The house is still on offer. Houses are scarce just now.
I have sown my Wyandottes.
* * * * *
It was the income-tax man that suggested the title that I have given
to my story. I disagreed with him _in toto_. But he persisted that it
wasn't an "expense."
* * * * *
[Illustration: _Ex-Soldier_ (_to stout passenger_). "MIGHT I SUGGEST,
SIR, THAT EITHER YOU PASS FURTHER DOWN THE CAR OR TAKE A COURSE OF
PHYSICAL TRAINING?"]
* * * * *
[Illustration: _Mr. Skivvington-Smyth (loudly)._ "COVENT GARDEN!"
_Taximan (equally loudly)._ "MARKET?"]
* * * * *