CATCHING THE THANKSGIVING TURKEY
It was the night before Thanksgiving rather than Christmas, and in the
house all was quiet as a mouse. But not so in the barnyard. Everything
there was confusion and hubbub for the biggest, fattest turkey gobbler
of the flock was to be captured and killed for the Thanksgiving feast.
He had lived to see all his flock slain with the exception of a young
gobbler and three or four turkey hens. Consequently when he saw a boy
and a man come into the barnyard and walk toward him, holding out hands
filled with corn and wheat, he had his suspicions. He had seen sixty or
seventy members of his flock go up to men to eat from their hands only
to be grabbed by the neck and carried off, never to be seen again. It
was because of this that when anyone offered him anything to eat, no
matter what it was, he drew in his feathers, stuck out his neck and ran
for dear life and hid until they had left the barnyard.
It was growing dusk now and he had just fallen into a doze as he
rested in his usual roosting place on the lower limb of an old oak
tree behind the woodpile. Suddenly he was rudely awakened by someone
catching hold of one of his legs. He roused with a start to find it was
a big boy trying to capture him. With a spasm of fear he flapped his
wings and tried to fly to a higher limb, but he was unable to do that
for the boy grasped one of his legs firmly and pulled him back.
Just then the gobbler spied Billy Whiskers standing by the woodpile and
he gobbled for him to aid him. “Save me! Save me, Billy!”
In a flash Billy ran up the woodpile on which the boy was standing.
This started the wood to rolling, and the boy was forced to release the
turkey’s leg or have his own broken in a fall.
“Oh, Billy, why _can’t_ you mind your own business and not stick your
nose into what doesn’t concern you?” he exclaimed.
The moment the old gobbler was released, he tried to decide which would
be the safer place for him; higher up in the tree or a new hiding place
altogether. But where would that be? If he flew into another tree, they
would see him. If he chose the barn, they would follow him. Likewise if
he ran behind any of the straw stacks, they would follow there.
Oh where, oh where should he go? While the boy was getting off the
woodpile was his only chance for the man would soon return from
chasing the young gobbler and turkey hens. At last he decided to run
into the barn as there were numerous dark corners there where he could
hide. Once his mind was made up, it did not take long for him to fly
out of the tree and, half flying, half running, he made his way to the
barn. He went to the back door as that was out of sight of the man who
was chasing the other turkeys round and round the barn, over barrels
and under fences and about pigsties, with Billy Whiskers getting in
his way just when he reached out to take hold of a fowl and it would
escape. The man called Billy every name he could think of, and threw
stones at him too, but what cared he when he was doing his friends, the
turkeys, a good turn? He could not stand by and hear the pitiful call
of the turkeys and not try to do something to save them.
[Illustration]
Once the man succeeded in catching a young gobbler, and had him under
his arm carrying him away to have his head chopped off, when the turkey
called, “Billy, save me quickly or it will be too late! He is carrying
me to the block to chop off my head! I have seen all my brothers and
sisters go this terrible way. Oh, quick, Billy, quick! Do something or
it will be too late!”
Billy baaed back to the poor panic-stricken young turkey, “I will! I
will save you!” and all the other fowls in the barnyard and even the
pigs in the pens and the cows standing around chewing their cuds called
out, “Oh, hurry, Billy, hurry or you will be too late!”
The man was almost to the fatal block but Billy was creeping up still
closer and closer to him until he was only six feet away. Then with a
little bound Billy gave the man a butt that sent man, turkey and all
away over the block, the fellow falling on his face and releasing the
turkey as he fell. The moment that turkey found itself free it ran
toward the barn and quickly disappeared in the darkness within.
The man was so intensely angry at Billy that he picked up a club and
started in pursuit of him. But he might just as well have attempted to
catch a whirlwind as Billy when he was on the run. However, he chased
him away out into the pasture until Billy took the path to the lake.
Then he realized it was useless to follow any further as he would be
unable to overtake him before he reached the lake, and he knew if he
followed that far Billy would swim it and he could not do that in late
November with any comfort. So back he went to the barnyard grumbling to
himself, “Well, if I can’t catch that turkey, I will another if I have
to stay up all night to do it!”
When he reached the barnyard he heard Mr. Watson and Hiram as well as
the two boys laughing so he hurried on to see what they were finding
so funny. He arrived just as it was all over, though he did see Hiram
shaking himself and picking hay out of his hair with one hand as with
the other he held out to Mr. Watson the big turkey gobbler, dead.
Yes, the one that had been up in the tree and had run to the barn to
hide. He had flown into the mow to hide and Hiram had seen a long
turkey feather fluttering on the hay of the loft as if it had just
been dropped. Climbing up the ladder, he saw Mr. Turkey trying to hide
himself in the hay. After a long chase and many a fall for both man and
turkey, as hay is difficult to run on, Hiram succeeded in catching him.
He was going toward the ladder to descend to the barn floor and in the
dim light of the mow he did not see the hay chute. Before he knew it,
he had walked straight into the opening and had slid to the bottom,
landing on his head and shoulders, but with the turkey still clasped to
his breast. In some way the turkey’s neck had been twisted in the fall
and when they looked at him after Hiram stood up, they found him dead.
But he died in a good cause for the next day he with two other turkeys
made all the family and several of their most intimate neighbors happy
as they feasted on his tender meat thickly covered with rich gravy.
Such a dinner as that was! The table fairly groaned under the load of
goodies. Two tables had been put together and they extended through the
dining room into the living-room, furnishing seats for twenty, to say
nothing of a third table spread for the children so they would not have
to wait until the grown-ups had eaten. You see Mrs. Watson thought it
cruel to make children wait when in all probability they were hungrier
than the grown-ups as children always have healthy appetites while some
adults suffer with dyspepsia. There were several servants to wait on
the table, as Mrs. Watson had seen to that. She did not like to jump up
and down when she acted as hostess. And neither did she have the dinner
served in courses, with the exception of the soup and dessert.
The tables were most tastily decorated with strings of cranberries
and the dishes were garnished with all sorts of flowers cut from
vegetables. There were roses cut from beets, white roses formed from
mashed potatoes, tulips cut out of yellow carrots, and so forth. The
turkeys were festooned with cranberries and surrounded with vegetable
flowers. But the most gorgeous thing on the entire table was a graceful
basket of fruit and flowers combined. Here and there peeked out a
yellow grapefruit beside a red, red apple, while a bunch of blue or
white grapes cuddled next a banana or tangerine, all arranged in a most
artistic manner, with a bunch of huge Malaga grapes tied to the handle
with a bright scarlet ribbon bow.
This basket was flanked on either side by a little pig roasted whole
with a red apple in its mouth, while at both ends of the table rested
the big twenty-pound turkeys browned to a turn. Here and there were
vegetable dishes heaped high with fluffy mashed potatoes sprinkled with
paprika. There were also candied sweet potatoes half hidden in their
candy dip, while sparkling glass dishes held molds of cranberries,
preserved cherries, pickled peaches, candied watermelon rind and many
kinds of salted nuts. All these things were on the tables at once,
including a delectable fruit salad. After the table was cleared of
these viands, the dessert was carried in, and I know all the guests
wondered how they could eat it. It consisted of mince pie, apple pie,
cranberry pie and pumpkin pie served with cheese, followed by ice-cream
with chocolate sauce poured over it, angel cake, chocolate layer cake
and nut cake, while sweet cider made right on the farm sparkled in the
glasses and the aroma of the best of coffee arose from the cups.
“I shall not be able to eat for a week after this dinner, Mrs. Watson,”
said one of her guests on leaving the table.
“Oh, yes, you will,” replied the hostess. “Mr. Watson always says the
same thing but by seven-thirty he is ready to eat again and he says,
‘Did I hear you say, mama (that is what he always calls me) that we are
not going to have any supper after our late dinner? Well, I don’t mind
much, but I feel as if I could wash down a small piece of cold turkey
and a stalk or two of celery.’ And I always tell him if he feels that
way, to go to the ice-box and help himself. Which he does and I can’t
see but what he eats as heartily as if he had not had such a heavy
dinner. But then he is so passionately fond of turkey and the things
which go with it.”
After dinner the men were smoking and the ladies were upstairs primping
and chatting when everyone was startled by the most terrific banging of
tin cans. It sounded as if a whole tin shop was being wrecked.
They all ran to the windows to see what was happening and what they saw
caused gales of laughter, for there was Billy Whiskers running around
frantically trying to get the ice-cream freezer off his head. He had
been nosing around and, discovering the freezer, had tasted the salt
on the ice. In endeavoring to get more of the salt, Billy had upset
the whole thing and his horns had been caught in the tub that held the
freezer and the ice pack. The more he tried to get the tub off his
head, the more it stuck.
He tossed his head up and down and tried to bang the tub on the ground
and smash it, but it was too strongly made to break. The metal bands
held it together. Then he rolled over and over, but no use. He got
up and ran as fast as he could, but being unable to see where he was
going, the first thing he knew he ran straight into the little duck
pond half way down the hill. As he went in, he hit the edge of the tub
on the concrete rim of the artificial pond--and he was free! But Billy
was so disgusted that instead of coming out where he leaped in, he
swam straight across the pond, climbed out and ran down the hill into
the woods where he stayed until he recovered from his chagrin, for no
one saw him until noon the next day. Billy could not stand it to have
anything or anybody get the better of him.
[Illustration]
With the exception of this one slight mishap every person at the dinner
and every animal and fowl in the barnyard (for they had a double
portion to eat, too, as it was Thanksgiving) declared it was the best
Thanksgiving Day they had ever passed.