i88 BIRDS IN TOWN AND VILLAGE 



worst, to my mind, is that unwholesome coop at 

 the back where a dozen unhappy birds are usually 

 to be found immured for life. These, more fortunate, 

 had ample room to run about in, and countless broad 

 shady leaves from which to pick the green cater- 

 pillar, and red tortoise-shaped lady-bird, and parti- 

 coloured fly, and soft warm soil in which to bathe 

 in their own gallinaceous fashion, and to lie with 

 outstretched wings luxuriating by the hour in the 

 genial sunshine. And having seen their free whole- 

 some life, I did not regard the new-laid egg on the 

 breakfast-table with a feeling of repugnance, but 

 ate it with a relish, 



I have said that the fowls numbered fifteen ; 

 five were old birds, and ten were chickens, closely 

 alike in size, colour and general appearance. They 

 were not the true offspring of the hen that reared 

 them, but hatched from eggs bought from a local 

 poultry-breeder. As they advanced in age to their 

 teens, or the period in chicken-life corresponding 

 to that in which, in the human species, boy and 

 girl begin to diverge, their tails grew long, and they 

 developed very fine red combs ; but the lady of the 

 house, who had been promised good layers when she 

 bought the eggs, clung tenaciously to the belief that 

 long arching tails and stately crests were ornaments 

 common to both sexes in this particular breed. By 

 and by they commenced to crow, first one, then 



