356 Junior Naturalist Monthly. 



What do you think Tom gave his Httle chickens to eat? "Com, 

 wheat, and oats?" No, indeed, Tom knew that they could not 

 swallow such large grains. He gave them some bread and milk, but 

 he was careful to squeeze the milk out. Little chickens should not 

 have wet or sloppy food, you know. They enjoyed moist bread 

 and old Cinnamon taught them to eat it. She picked up some bread 

 with her beak and called, "Cut, cut, cut!" and the little fellows came 

 running to her and jumped up to pick the bread from her mouth. 



Tom always fed the chickens on a clean board or shingle, and he 

 was careful not to give them more than they could eat up clean, for 

 he did not want the food to get dirty and sour and make his pets sick. 

 He was always careful to see that old Cinnamon had her share, too. 

 On the very first day, Tom placed some fine gravel by the coop for 

 the chickens to eat. Do you know why he did this? It was because 

 chickens have no teeth with which to chew their food. They have, 

 however, a place in their bodies called a gizzard, which is hard and 

 tough and which grinds grain with the gravel until it crushes the 

 food up fine. If they do not have any gravel or grit, they cannot 

 digest their food easily. If you will hold a little chicken close to your 

 ear and listen, you can hear the stones grinding in the gizzard. 



After a few days, the chickens were fed a mixture of finely cracked 

 grain and chopped hard-boiled eggs. Sometimes pot cheese was 

 given them instead of the eggs. Cracked corn and cracked wheat 

 and oatmeal made a splendid variety. How those chickens grew! 

 "Did he give them any water to drink?" Yes, indeed, they had 

 water to drink the very first day. Tom made a nice fountain out 

 of a flower pot saucer and a tin drinking cup, which kept the chickens 

 from falling hito the water and getting all wet. 



Right here is where Tom's trouble began, and it taught him a 

 good lesson about carelessness. When he filled the fountain, in the 

 morning, he left the pail standing there partly filled with water. 

 When he returned, there was one of his largest chickens drowned in 

 the water pail. How sad he felt! He knew that he was the one to 

 be blamed. It was all because he had forgotten to take the jjail away, 

 and he told old Cinnamon that he would never be so thoughtless 

 again. 



A few days later when Tom counted his chickens, one was missing. 

 He searched high and low for it, but it could not be found. The 

 next day another disappeared. When Saturday came, Tom hid 

 behind the bushes and waited for the chicken thief. There he waited 

 and waited, until it was nearly dark and the chickens were calling 

 loudly for their supper. Suddenly he heard a chicken scream and 



