The Chinaman told his story to the General and a few minutes later a number of the little people were on their way to Mrs. Bunch’s coop. The old hen saw the little people coming and she was so excited she sat down and laid an egg right before the Teenie Weenies.
In just a few minutes the little folks set about cutting a hole in the ice, and it was quite a hard task, for the water was frozen to the depth of one Teenie Weenie foot.
“Well, here’s to your health,” said Mother Bunch when the little men had chopped a hole through the ice, and dipping her big yellow beak into the cold water she filled her bill and raising her head she let it trickle down her throat.
The pan which held the old hen’s water had a long handle and the Dunce thought it great fun to crawl up on the handle and slide down to the edge of the pan. He did this several times with great success, but finally failed to catch the edge of the pan and he slid off onto the ice, and dropped kersplash into the cold water.
He was dragged out by the Turk and was sent home in disgrace, to the great amusement of the old hen.
Mrs. Bunch presented the egg she laid to the Teenie Weenies for their kindness, and the little people went home, happy to have such a friendly neighbor.
- Transcriber’s Notes:
- Missing or obscured punctuation was corrected.
- Unbalanced quotation marks were left as the author intended.
- Typographical errors were silently corrected.
- Spelling and hyphenation were made consistent when a predominant form was found in this book; otherwise it was not changed.