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."