“Poor thing! what’ll she do with a family?” said Goody Kertarkut.
“Well, what business have such young flirts to get married?” said Dame Scratchard. “I don’t expect she’ll raise a single chick; and there’s Gray Cock flirting about, fine as ever. Folks didn’t do so when I was young. I’m sure my husband knew what treatment a sitting hen ought to have,—poor old Long Spur! he never minded a peck or so and then. I must say these modern fowls ain’t what fowls used to be.”
Meanwhile the sun rose and set, and Master Fred was almost the only friend and associate of poor little Mrs. Feathertop, whom he fed daily with meal and water, and only interrupted her sad reflections by pulling her up occasionally to see how the eggs were coming on.
At last “Peep, peep, peep,” began to be heard in the nest, and one little downy head after another poked forth from under the feathers, surveying the world with round, bright, winking eyes; and gradually the brood were hatched, and Mrs. Feathertop arose, a proud and happy mother, with all the bustling, scratching, care-taking instincts of family-life warm within her breast. She clucked and scratched, and cuddled the little downy bits of things as handily and discreetly as a seven-year-old hen could have done, exciting thereby the wonder of the community.
Master Gray Cock came home in high spirits, and complimented her; told her she was looking charmingly once more, and said, “Very well, very nice,” as he surveyed the young brood. So that Mrs. Feathertop began to feel the world going well with her, when suddenly in came Dame Scratchard and Goody Kertarkut to make a morning call.
“Let’s see the chicks,” said Dame Scratchard.
“Goodness me,” said Goody Kertarkut, “what a likeness to their dear papa!”
“Well, but bless me, what’s the matter with their bills?” said Dame Scratchard. “Why, my dear, these chicks are deformed! I’m sorry for you, my dear; but it’s all the result of your inexperience. You ought to have eaten pebble-stones with your meal when you were sitting. Don’t you see, Dame Kertarkut, what bills they have? That’ll increase, and they’ll be frightful!”
“What shall I do?” said Mrs. Feathertop, now greatly alarmed.