EASY-CHAIR MEMORIES 89 



forces had not been idle ; he, too, had mar- 

 shalled his men, and he hurled back his defiant 

 reply : 



" We list not to declare, said he, 

 Nor show whose men we be ; 

 Yet will we spend our dearest blood, 

 Thy chieftest hens to slay." 



Our Sultan swore a solemn oath and thus in 

 rage did say : 



" Ere thus I will outbraved be, 

 One of us two shall die ; 

 Let thou and I the battle try, 

 And set our men aside." 



But the young cocks, and hens, too, were 

 as eager for battle as their chiefs, and wouldn't 

 listen to a single-handed combat ; so at it they 

 went, not by any means in a helter-skelter sort 

 of way, as one might have expected from these 

 hot-headed, hare-brained birds. They marched 

 straight up in single line, the two chiefs at the 

 head of their respective columns, until they ' 

 came within a yard or two of each other, face 

 to face; then our chief gobbled something 

 which sounded like : 



. come on, Macduff, 

 And cursed be he that first cries, " Hold, enough ! " 



