"She's the most wonderful female in feathers!" assented Eustace fervently.
"However," added the rooster, "there are compensations about having a dull one." For among the crowd of onlookers his eye had just fallen upon a little bantam lady whom he had never seen before.
II
HIS COOP IN ORDER
If there was one thing that the sympathetic heart of Eustace could not endure, it was the spectacle of abused virtue.
"Gertrude," quacked he thoughtfully to his help-meet, as they were cruising one day on the frog-pond, "I am really distressed about Martha. Her husband is acting shamelessly."
Gertrude shrugged her wings. "Well, what else could you expect?" she said. "The silly hen has brought it all on herself by being so humble and simpleminded."
"I'm afraid she has," admitted Eustace. "And that is the sad part about it; for she's really such a fine female—so unselfish, so devoted to her nest."
"Yes, and such a fool. She's never taken any care of her personal appearance, or tried to be Clarence's intellectual companion; and now, when she's getting old (she must be nearly five) and has lost the figure she had when she was a pullet, it's no wonder that she bores him. You can't expect to hold a rooster's affections with a mere egg record."
"I suppose you're right. And yet I'm awfully sorry for her. It's common talk at the haystack that he has just added another affinity to the three he had already."