SOME COMMONPLACE FOWLS. 
33 
was far and away ahead of all the others in quickness of sight 
and nimbleness of appropriation. 
Some of the boys who attend the village school come from a 
distance and bring their dinners with them, and are glad in the 
summer months to do odd jobs about my garden. From June 
to October they are very willing to sift cinders, sweep the paths, 
&c., for the privilege of eating their noon-meat in peace, pro- 
tected from the onslaughts of the boys of our own village, who 
have big brothers and mothers to take their part in cases of 
difficulty. One notices, that, somehow, the gooseberry trees that 
line the garden path bear heavier crops on the garden side than 
on the patli side ; that the apples on the lower branches of the 
trees do not all come to perfection ; that there are unaccountable 
gaps in the hedge. But I can remember the time when I, too, 
could appreciate the flavour of an unripe gooseberry with the 
best, and they are good boys on the whole and discreet. 
One of them, Teddy, not long ago asked if he might feed the 
hens. He was permitted to do so, but incautiously held in his 
left hand as he entered the precincts of the hen-house his 
“thumb-piece,” i.e., a hunch of bread with a morsel of cheese 
under his thumb. Hippety, who was apparently dozing, made 
a miraculous leap and had the cheese ! She forthwith rushed 
round to the back of the building with her prize, and long before 
Teddy had recovered his senses, or any of her fellows were 
aware of what was happening, had gobbled it. Teddy came 
back and made a representation of his case at the back door. 
He hadn’t even “tasted of it.” My eldest son ran down and 
scolded Hippety, but she only crouched at his feet and looked 
up with a “ gallus ” kind of submissive acquiescence. She knew 
she ought not to have taken it, but the taste of it was sweet to 
her palate, and now no one could take it away. Necessarily, 
Teddy was supplied with a fresh piece, which, however, did not 
bite his tongue as good cheese should, and he never really 
forgave her. Space will not suffice to tell how she by cunning 
more than held her own among her mates, or slipped past one 
into the garden, where she wrought devastation (she had also a 
weakness for spring onions), eluding capture. It usually took 
four boys placed at separate points of strategic importance, and 
one or two skirmishes to get her back. 
Men and women, and hens too, die, and at last — Hippety- 
hop’s time came. She died on her nest after a few days’ indis- 
position, and rests among the fruit bushes. This was a month 
ago, and, strange to say, the other hens will not lay where she 
died. They took up quite other quarters for their egg-laying 
business on her demise. Lately, some have returned to the 
adjacent nests, but not one to the deathbed of Hippety-hop. 
J. Lewton Brain. 
