CHAPTER I
JOAN AND THE CANARIES
I wonder if you have ever watched young chickens. You can’t help liking such babyish, fluffy little things; they are so sweet and so different from the grown-up hens. I know a little girl who cried out, “Look at all those canaries!” Of course, they are not really a bit like canaries, and it was only because of their yellow coats that she made the mistake.
Chickens are so lively and cheery, too; even when they are only a day old they are able to feed themselves, and will run about picking up grain. For such babies they are quite bold and will wander off a long way from the coop, but when anything alarming comes along they will all rush back to Mother Hen, making funny little peeping noises showing they are rather frightened; and she answers, “Tuk, tuk,” as much as to say, “You are little sillies, but I’m very fond of you,” and takes them under her wing.
Joan was the little girl who had called them canaries, and you may guess how she got teased about it. She had come to stay with an aunt who had a farm, and as Joan had always lived in a town, she couldn’t be expected to know very much about animals or birds. She liked the cows and the goats and the horses but she loved the chickens best of all. When she was missing, her aunt always knew where to find her, and the chickens seemed to know her too and were tamer with her than with any one else.
When anything alarming comes along they will all rush back to Mother Hen.
A little tapping sound.
Several of the hens were sitting on their eggs, and Joan was told she mustn’t go near them or disturb them at all. While a hen is sitting she doesn’t want to be bothered to think of anything else except how she can best keep her eggs warm and safe. She has to be careful and patient till the chicks are ready to come out. This is an exciting time, and Joan used often to think about it. She did wish so she might see a chicken burst through its shell. She imagined there would be a little tapping sound, and that the other chickens would be very interested and listen, and then the shell would suddenly open and out would spring a fluffy yellow chicken. She had been to a pantomime once called “Aladdin,” and there had been a huge egg, supposed to be a Roc’s egg. In the last scene this egg was in the middle of the stage. A dancer struck it with a wand, when it opened, and out sprang a full grown fairy, dressed in orange and gold, with a skirt of fluffy yellow feathers. Somehow Joan had always imagined a chicken would begin its life in this dramatic way.