“Not far enough,” said Royal. “It must be driven in very deep and strong, or else the string which ties the apple-tree to it, will pull it over to one side.”
So Royal went and got the small crowbar, and came back dragging it along. He made a deep hole by the side of the apple-tree, but not very near it, for he did not want to hurt the roots. Then he took out the bar, and laid it down upon the grass, and inserted the point of the stake into the hole which he had made.
While he was doing this, Lucy took hold of one end of the iron bar, and tried to lift it.
“O, what a heavy bar!” said she.
“I don’t think it is very heavy,” said Royal. So saying, he drove down his stake with repeated blows of his hatchet.
“You are a great deal stronger than I am,” said Lucy. “You can drive the stake down very hard indeed. I don’t believe but that you could make a hen-coop.”
“Who told you anything about a hen-coop?” said Royal.
“Joanna,” said Lucy. “She said that she was a farmer’s daughter when she was a little girl, and that she had a hen and some chickens; and that her brother made her a hen-coop pretty much like the turtle-pen you made down by the brook.”
“I could make a hen-coop,” said Royal, “I know,—and I mean to. Perhaps I can get some hens to put into it. At all events, I shall have a hen-coop.”
“If I was a farmer’s daughter,” said Lucy, “I should have hens.”