One would think that with such a good mother as the Barred Plymouth
Rock Hen, Chickens should have been contented to mind her and follow
wherever she went, and usually hers did. One day, however, two of the
brothers coaxed their good little sister to go with them to visit the
Chickens at the farm across the road. The brothers had teased and
teased their mother to let them go there, but she had always refused.
"Why?" they said.
"Because," answered the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen, "you have enough
room and enough playmates right here at home, and I know that you are
safe and well here. I do not know what might happen to you there."
"Oh, _why_ can't we go?" teased the brothers, who had just been given
an answer to that same question, and were very rude to keep on asking
it.
Of course the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen had had too much experience
with Chickens to reply again to a question which should not have been
asked the second time, and might better not have been asked the first.
So she just turned her back and walked off, clucking to her brood as
she went. The brothers who had been teasing did not like that at all,
and they put their naughty little heads together and decided to run
away.
"Let's get Little Sister to go along," said Older Brother.
"Why?" asked Younger Brother. "She can't run as fast as we can, and
she's so good that it wouldn't be much fun anyway. We wouldn't get
across the road before she'd want to come back and be afraid our
mother would worry about us."
"That is just why I want her to go along," said Older Brother. "We'll
get her to go, and then our mother will think that we are not any
worse than she is, and perhaps she won't peck us so hard when we get
back."
"All right," said Younger Brother, fluttering his wings with
impatience. "Let's get her right now. I know our mother won't scold
her."
You see both of the brothers forgot that the reason why their mother
had never scolded Little Sister was that Little Sister had never done
anything wrong. She was really the best Chicken in the brood, and she
had such a sweet way of running to the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen during
the day and cuddling close to her for a short rest, that it was not
strange her mother was especially fond of her.
Now the two naughty brothers found Little Sister and began talking to
her. "Ever been across the road?" asked Older Brother, carelessly, as
he snapped off a blade of grass.
"No," said Little Sister. "Mother never goes."
"There are some very jolly Chickens on that farm," remarked Younger
Brother. "One of them asked us to come over a little while ago."
"Wouldn't it be fun!" exclaimed Little Sister. "Let's ask Mother if we
can't all go."
"Aw, they won't want the whole brood at once," said Older Brother.
"Besides, our mother is way over in the edge of the pasture now, and
there isn't any use in bothering her. I tell you what let's do. Let's
just go down to our side of the road and see if those other Chickens
are there now. Then we can ask them if they don't want us to come over
some other day."
You see the brothers knew that it would never do to ask their sister
to run away with them at first, for she would have said "No," and run
off to tell the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen, and that would have spoiled
all their naughty fun.
The three little White Plymouth Rocks put down their heads and
scurried along as fast as they could toward the road. Older Brother
planned it so that the fence should hide them from their mother as
they ran, but he said nothing of this to Little Sister, for she was
not used to being naughty, and he knew that he would have to go about
it very carefully to get her to run away. When they reached the road
they saw the Chickens on the other side, but they were well within
their own farm-yard.
"Oh, isn't that too bad!" exclaimed Little Sister. "Now you can't ask
them what you wanted to."
"We might run over and speak to them about it now," said Younger
Brother. "Mother won't care. After we have come so far to see them, it
seems too bad to miss our chance. Come on and we can be across before
that team gets here." Both the brothers put down their heads and ran
as fast as they could, and Little Sister followed after them. When
they were on the other side she began to cry and wanted to go back.
"I n-n-never did such a thing in all my l-l-life," she sobbed, "and I
know our mother won't like it. Let's go right back."
"Oh, don't act like a Gosling," said Older Brother. "You're over here
now and you might as well have a good time. What if our mother does
scold when we get back? She never wants us to have a bit of fun, and
we're just as safe here as we were at home."
Little Sister did not feel at all happy, still, you know how hard it
is to stop being naughty when you have once begun, and she found it
hard. She would gladly have returned at once if her brothers had been
willing to go with her, but when she found that they were going to
stay, she stayed with them. The Chickens whom they were visiting were
very jolly and full of fun, although they were of common families and
had not been carefully brought up. They did many things which the
little White Plymouth Rocks had never been allowed to do, and in a
short time the visitors were doing just the same as they.
These Chickens even made fun of each other when they had accidents,
and Little Sister heard them laughing at three or four who were acting
as though they were sick and opening their bills very wide. "What is
the matter with those Chickens?" she asked.
"Oh, they have the gapes," answered one of the Chickens who lived
there, and then he began speaking of something else.
It is very sad to have to tell such a thing, but the truth is that the
three White Plymouth Rock Chickens did not return to their home until
nearly roosting-time. Even Little Sister pecked and squabbled and
acted like the rest. They walked up the tongue of a hay wagon that
stood in the yard, and scrambled and fluttered until they were on the
edge of the rack. "Dare you to fly down into the old hen-yard," said
one of the Chickens who lived on the place. "We used to live in there
until a few days ago, and then the Farmer turned us out and shut the
gate after us."
"Why did he do that?" asked Older Brother.
"I don't know," was the answer. "Nobody knows why Farmers do things. I
think he did it just to be mean. There were fine Angleworms in there,
and now we can't get one of them. Dare you to fly down there! You can
get out somehow."
Older Brother was not brave enough to refuse, so over he flew, and
Younger Brother came after him. The other Chickens fluttered along
with them and Younger Brother gave Little Sister a shove that sent her
over the fence when he went. They found a great many Angleworms there,
and ate and ate and ate, and tried to get the largest ones away from
each other; but after a while the Farmer's Wife saw them and came
running to shoo them out with her apron. Little Sister was really glad
when this happened, for she had found no place where she could crawl
through the fence. She would have told her brothers about it if she
had not feared that they would laugh at her and call her a coward. She
did not know that each of them was thinking the same thing and dared
not speak of it for the same reason. Of course the Chickens who lived
on that farm all the time did not care so much. Naughty Chickens,
like the three little run-aways, are almost sure to think about their
mothers when the sun begins to set and the shadows on the grass grow
long. Then they begin to think about home, too, and wish that they did
not have to be ashamed of themselves.
When these brothers and their sister got out of the hen-yard, they
started straight for home. At first they ran, and quite fast too, but
as they got nearer they began to go more slowly, and once in a while
one of them would stop to peck at something or other. You see they
were thinking of what the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen would be likely to
say to them. They thought that they would find her in the old coop
where they had lived when first hatched. They ran the fields now, yet
always went back there to spend the nights.
They were trying so hard to find excuses for themselves that they did
not notice the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen behind the stone-pile in the
lane. She had got the rest of her brood settled in the coop for the
night and then started out in search of the wanderers. As soon as they
passed the stone-pile, she ducked her head and ran after them as fast
as she could, dragging the tips of her wings on the ground and pecking
at them hard and fast. You should have seen them run. They fluttered
their wings wildly and never thought of making excuses. The one thing
they remembered was that if they only reached the coop they could
crawl in under their good brothers and sisters and be safe from their
mother's bill.
Little Sister got punished as well as her brothers, and that was
perfectly right. For she need not have gone with them, even if they
did ask her. It may be that her mother did not peck her quite so hard
as she did the others, but it was hard enough to make her glad to
reach the coop at last. The good Chickens were almost asleep when
these three dived in under them, and it took some time for them all to
get settled again. The Barred Plymouth Rock Hen sat down beside the
pile of her children and looked very hot and severe, yet she did not
scold them then.
The rest of the brood were sound asleep when Little Sister slipped out
from under them to cuddle close to her mother. She could not sleep
until she had confessed it all, and that shows that she was a good
Chicken at heart. When she told about their getting into the closed
hen-yard, and how they had been driven out of it, the Barred Plymouth
Rock Hen looked very much startled. "Did any of your playmates over
there go around with their mouths open?" said she.
"Oh yes," replied Little Sister. "A good many of them did, and the
rest of us laughed at them." Then she drooped her head because she
felt ashamed of having been so rude.
"I am afraid the punishment I gave you will be only a small part of
it," said the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen; "but now you must go to sleep,
and we will not talk any more of your naughtiness. You did quite right
to tell me all about it."