THE BARN DOOR HENS. 13 



adjunct to the pair of them, and it is by their " deeds" 

 in the end that you value the twain ; but there, I 

 think, the analogy ends. Your hen requires no pay- 

 ment beyond the run of her beak, and some aqua 

 pur a or Chateau Grenouilles, as it has been called 

 by a witty Frenchman ; six and eightpences she wots 

 not of ; while, as to the other, well, we all know pretty 

 well that when it comes to the " plucking" it is hardly 

 usual to find the victim in the legal adviser; and, if 

 you invite your lawyer to dinner, he expects the best 

 of everything, and usually evinces a very pretty 

 penchant for old port. But a truce to this levity, we 

 must no longer frivol. 



And, since I never dare to write 

 As funny as I can. 



HOLMES (The Music Grinders}. 



Let us now suppose that, beside what outside eggs 

 he may be able to pick up, the keeper has been 

 promised, say, a thousand purchased eggs, to help 

 him along; for these he will require about seventy 

 hens, all well settled in their boxes, and warranted 

 tame and quiet, to commence their maternal duties 

 immediately upon the arrival of the hampers con- 

 taining the eggs for incubation. If these hens have 

 to be procured from the farmers and cottagers in the 

 neighbourhood, the keeper should commence his 

 higgling operations as soon as ever he finds the first 

 wild egg. This outside purchasing of mothers is at 

 best (though often, of course, unavoidable) an unsatis- 



