"Don't talk to me about secrets," said the fair foreigner; "I never trouble my head about such things."
"Some people are very fond of drawing attention to their heads," said the common hen; "and if other people didn't think more of a great unnatural-looking chignon than of all the domestic virtues put together, they might have their confidences respected."
"I's* all very well," said Father Cock, "but you're all alike. There's not a hen can know a secret without going and telling it."
"Well, come!" said a little Bantam hen, who had newly arrived; "whichever hen told it, the cock must have told it first."
"What's that ridiculous nonsense your talking?" cried the cock; and he ran at her and pecked her well with his beak.
"Oh! oh! oh!" cried the Bantam.
Dab, dab, dab, pecked the cock.
"Now! has anybody else got anything to say on the subject?"
But nobody had. So he flew up on to the wall, and cried "Cock-a-doodle-doo!"
