1899 
875 
The Minister’s Henhouse. 
Part I. 
Rev. Sigourney Hardwicke, of South 
Hanaford, was very successful with 
hens. He had begun with a hen and 12 
chickens which a neighbor had given 
him, and he now had a flock of 50. Of 
course all this had not been accom¬ 
plished without a severe attack of hen 
fever, but as the disease did not lead 
him to neglect his pastoral duties, there 
was none in his flock—his human flock 
—who complained of his devotion to the 
feathered bipeds. 
When he had but 13, an old dry-goods 
box slatted with laths was a sufficient 
shelter, and later, when his hatches 
averaged 11 to the setting, the woodshed 
sufficed to house them all; but now with 
50 the woodshed was sadly inadequate, 
and unless he could manage to provide 
a better abode for them before snow 
flew, his success with fowls would be 
numbered among the lost arts. Some 
men would have bought a hammer and 
a pound or two of nails and would have 
knocked together a good-enough hen¬ 
house, but although the Rev. Sigourney 
Hardwicke had a hypnotic way of en¬ 
couraging hens to lay When other folk 
were vainly clamorous for eggs, and al¬ 
though he could bring the most frac¬ 
tious hen through the period of incuba¬ 
tion without any desertion of nest, sim¬ 
ply by moral suasion and the force of a 
good example, he hadn’t the slightest 
skill in the use of tools. 
The Rev. Mr. Hardwicke was short 
and gtout and jolly, and it was said of 
him that the roosters crowed for joy at 
the sight of him, and the hens would 
hurry off to their nests to lay extra eggs 
for him whenever occasion demanded. 
He lived alone in the big parsonage— 
the last incumbent had had 13 children 
and a wife—for although he believed, 
with the Bible, that it is not good for 
man to be alone, yet he was still wait¬ 
ing for just the right helpmeet. 
One morning a few days before 
Thanksgiving, when to the typical coun¬ 
try sounds had been added the pleasant 
noise of fowls scratching among fallen 
and crisp leaves, and the air was pun¬ 
gent with Autumn smoke, Woodford 
Upham drove by the parsonage just as 
the paison came out of the kitchen door 
to feed his flock. They were all Black 
Langshans, and as handsome a group 
of birds as one would be likely to see 
outside of a poultry show, their merits 
appealing 'to layman and fancier alike. 
Mr. Hardwicke had a peculiar call for 
his fowls. “Too-hoo, hoo, hoo, hoo,” he 
sang in a resonant tenor, and the dusky 
birds came flocking from all corners of 
the field, where they had been scratch¬ 
ing, to pick up the grain which their 
master was sowing broadcast. Was his 
Sunday flock as eager for spiritual sus¬ 
tenance? 
Mr. Upham reined up. “Where in 
tarn—where do you keep ’em?” said he, 
as the mob of fowls pushed and shoved 
like a human crowd at a public function. 
“Well, they keep the woodshed warm 
holding ’em,” said the minister with a 
chuckle. “I’m thinking seriously of 
giving up my study to them and taking 
to the woods myself.” 
Mr. Upham threw the reins over his 
horse’s ample girth and got out of the 
wagon. 
“They are pretty,” said he emphat¬ 
ically. “I used to think that a hen was 
a hen, but I don’t know-” 
“Well, I’ve killed off all my roosters, 
so they really are hens,” said the min¬ 
ister with a whimsical smile. 
“Yes, but I mean I believe there is 
something in breed. You ought to have 
a henhouse. Your hens are gettin’ 
themselves talked about a good deal. 
Mrs. Upham says it does her more good 
than a sermon to see the way you’ve 
managed to make your hens pay. She 
never has eggs unless they’re so plenty 
it would be scandalous not to, and she 
often asks me to find out how you man¬ 
age it.” 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER’ 
Mr. Hardwicke stooped over and 
stroked the greenish-black back of a 
matron of two Summers. “That’s it; I 
manage it. If a hen ought to lay and 
won’t, I tempt her palate with hot food, 
and I talk to her a little and tuck her 
in at night, and she generally looks at it 
my way after a few days. If she’s set¬ 
ting, and feels like visiting her neigh¬ 
bors instead of keeping her eggs warm, 
I talk a little more, and maybe shut her 
on her nest for a day or so, and she 
finally decides to stay by the ship like 
Captain Lawrence, and so I keep up my 
average of 11 to a brood. But in the 
hen business as in others eternal vigi¬ 
lance is the price of success.” 
“But you do need a henhouse,” said 
Mr. Upham, stepping over to the dimin¬ 
utive woodshed and looking in. 
“Yes, I do need a henhouse, but I 
don’t suppose that the society would 
think one a part of my perquisites, as 
I may not be here for life. There’s no 
telling how long you can stand my ser¬ 
mons.” 
“Well, I wouldn’t make ’em any 
longer,” said Mr. Upham, solemnly; 
“but I don’t know what we would have 
done for eggs last week when we had 
my Wife’s folks out to see us if we 
hadn’t been able to draw on your sup¬ 
ply, and I think it’s the general opinion 
that your salary ain’t so princely but we 
can manage somehow to squeeze out 
enough to put up a henhouse. And if 
we ever do decide to get another minis¬ 
ter—why, w’ll have to see to it that he 
keeps hens before we give him a call.” 
Mortimer Wallace, the Shakespearian 
reader, had a Summer home in South 
Hanaford, and he had gone in for fancy 
fowls for a time, but although he had 
read in Shakespeare that there is a tide 
in the affairs of men which leads on to 
fortune, he was out of town when the 
flood tide came, and so he reluctantly 
decided to sell the Buff Cochins, for 
which he had paid fancy prices, at the 
local quotation on fowls, which was 50 
cents a head—weight no objection. His 
last hen sold, he suffered a revulsion of 
feeling against henkind in general, and 
he longed to sell his henhouse that he 
might forget that hens existed. But to 
take it up and move it by ox-power 
would double its cost, and, besides. 
South Hanaford farmers thought it a 
trifle too ornate for every-day egg-lay¬ 
ing, and so he found no takers, although 
he set a tempting price upon it. But 
when Mr. Upham drove away from the 
minister’s he happened to pass the Wal¬ 
lace henhouse, and he immediately 
thought that here were two wants that 
offset each other—Mortimer Wallace’s 
wish to be rid of his perpetual reminder 
of his failure as a fancier, and the min¬ 
ister’s desire for an adequate dwelling 
for his thriving fowls.—-Saturday Even¬ 
ing Post. 
From the Kitchen Window. 
The Chrysanthemums grew so large 
and full of leaves that they shut out the 
light from the kitchen windows, where 
they are placed to catch the rays of 
sunlight that are few and far between 
just now. The earliest varieties have 
finished blooming, and been carried to 
the cellar, and the late sorts seem slow 
of opening. It is a temptation to throw 
them away, but we wait with what pa¬ 
tience we can •command to see if time 
will not develop the buds of promise 
into blossoms. Many people object to 
plants in the windows, but in the 
kitchen, where they get the steam from 
the stove, they generally thrive best. 
I was told lately of a commercial travel¬ 
er who was only home once a week, but 
landing in one Saturday when his wife 
had filled every window with plants, he 
grumbled very much at the intrusion- 
regardless of the fact that she probably 
enjoyed them in his absence. So after 
breakfast the next morning he re¬ 
marked fiercely: “If you keep those 
plants in the windows I shall pack my 
valise and leave the house. No matter 
where you try to look out you have to 
crane your neck among that medley 
lot.” To keep the peace and the pets at 
the same time, with the help of the 
children she carried the plants down to 
the cellar every Saturday morning, and 
returned them to their places on Mon¬ 
day.. Poor martyr to the love of flowers, 
I hope that they bloomed for her, and 
made her happy! I always trust a man 
who now and then takes or sends home 
a new plant to his wife* if She enjoys 
them, to add to her collection. 
Everyone cannot have a greenhouse, 
nor does everyone want one, for, unless 
a gardener can be kept, it is hard work 
caring for the plants, and the steam 
heat is not always best for those who 
are not strong. But a few bright flow¬ 
ering plants or bulbs in the kitchen 
window—a box of parsley—or a rose 
bush through the flowerless months, 
Will relieve many a dreary hour, when 
mind and body are tired, and if not too 
many are kept, it is a pleasure to give 
them a drink, and turn them to the 
light, taking an old knife as a cultivator 
to till the soil. 
We made grape marmalade lately, sit¬ 
ting beside the Window to stem the 
grapes, and working then while they 
cooked. It is very nice as a conserve, 
and though made with Concord grapes 
that were dropping from the stem, it is 
preferred to grape jelly by some of our 
family. They are stemmed and put to 
simmer in the preserving kettle, with¬ 
out any water, and after the pulp is 
freed from the seeds they are strained 
through a colander, and returned to the 
pot, using a pound of sugar to a pint 
or rather more of the pulp. It sets well, 
and is a pleasant variety in the way of 
preserves. annie l. jack. 
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