that lay everywhere in the field were fine
food, and should have made the little Shanghais as fat as the Grouse who
sometimes stole out from the edge of the forest. Eleven of the brood
were quite plump, but one Chicken was still thin and lank. His mother
was very much worried about him and could not think what was the matter.
She spoke of it to the Black Spanish Hen one day, but the Black Spanish
Hen had never raised a brood, and said she really didn't know any more
about the care of Chickens than if she were a Dove. Then the anxious
mother went to the Shanghai Cock about it. He listened to all she said
and looked very knowing.

"I don't think there is anything the matter," said he. "The Chick is
growing fast, that is all. I remember how it was with me before I got my
long tail-feathers. I was very thin, yet see what a fine-looking fellow
I am now." He was really a sight worth seeing as he towered above the
other fowls, flapping his strong wings in the sunshine and crowing. His
feathers were beautiful, and the bright red of his comb and wattles
showed that he was well. "Ah," thought the Shanghai Hen, "if my Chicken
could only become such a fine-looking Cock!" And she didn't worry any
more all day.

That night she and her brood roosted in the old apple-tree in the corner
of the orchard nearest the poultry-yard. She flew up with the older
fowls and fluttered and lurched and squawked and pushed on first one
branch and then another, while the Chickens were walking up a slanting
board that the farmer had placed against one of the lower branches. It
always takes fowls a long time to settle themselves for the night. They
change places and push each other, and sometimes one sleepy Hen leans
over too far and falls to the ground, and then has to begin all over
again.

At first the Chickens had feared that they would tumble off as soon as
they were asleep, but they soon learned that their feet and the feet of
all other birds are made in such a way that they hang on tightly even
during sleep. The weight of the bird's body above hooks the toes around
the branch, and there they stay until the bird wishes to unhook them.

After a long time, all the fowls were asleep with their heads under
their wings. The Sheep, Pigs, and Cows were dreaming, and even the
Horses were quiet in their stalls. There was not a light to be seen in
the big white farmhouse, when the Dorking Cock crowed in his sleep. That
awakened him and all the other fowl