CHAPTER IX.
MR. TOMPKINS’S SMALL STORY.
“It must be a small one,” said Mr. Tompkins.
“Oh, yes! we’ve agreed to that,” said Mr. Plummer.
Mr. Tompkins then asked if they were willing it should be merely a hen-story.
“We’ll take the vote on that,” cried Hiram. Then, turning to the company, he said,—
“Ladies and gentlemen, it is known to you that our friend Mr. Tompkins has paid his forfeit, and that he has been judged to redeem it by telling a story. It was no more than right for him to pay a forfeit; for he laughed at a quiet old lady who never did him any harm, and treated her in an unkind manner. Mr. Tompkins now wishes to know if his small story may be merely a hen-story. All who are willing that Mr. Tompkins’s small story shall be merely a hen-story please to say ‘Ay.’”
“Ay, ay, ay, ay!” was shouted many times by young and old; and, what with the shouting and the laughing and the hand-clapping, there was such a racket as set Snip a-barking at the top of his voice. Josephus crowed, and made his feet fly, and patted cakes, and tossed them up so high, that he nearly threw himself over backward. The cat hopped out of her private box, her tail standing straight in the air: and it is more than likely that the kittens’ eyes came open with wonder; which would have been a very great wonder indeed, seeing that the nine days were not much more than half over.
Mr. Tompkins then told the following short and simple story, which was written down upon the spot by the only person present who had a lead-pencil:—
There was once a hen who talked about another hen in a not very good way, and in a not at all friendly way. The hen she talked about was named Phe-endy Alome. Her own name was Teedla Toodlum. They both belonged to a flock of white hens which lived in the far-away country of Chickskumeatyourkornio.