CHAPTER IX.
MR. TOMPKINS’S SMALL STORY.
“It must be a small one,” said Mr. Tompkins.
“Oh, yes! we’ve agreed to that,” said Mr. Plummer.
Mr. Tompkins then asked if they were willing it should be merely a hen-story.
“We’ll take the vote on that,” cried Hiram. Then, turning to the company, he said,—
“Ladies and gentlemen, it is known to you that our friend Mr. Tompkins has paid his forfeit, and that he has been judged to redeem it by telling a story. It was no more than right for him to pay a forfeit; for he laughed at a quiet old lady who never did him any harm, and treated her in an unkind manner. Mr. Tompkins now wishes to know if his small story may be merely a hen-story. All who are willing that Mr. Tompkins’s small story shall be merely a hen-story please to say ‘Ay.’”
“Ay, ay, ay, ay!” was shouted many times by young and old; and, what with the shouting and the laughing and the hand-clapping, there was such a racket as set Snip a-barking at the top of his voice. Josephus crowed, and made his feet fly, and patted cakes, and tossed them up so high, that he nearly threw himself over backward. The cat hopped out of her private box, her tail standing straight in the air: and it is more than likely that the kittens’ eyes came open with wonder; which would have been a very great wonder indeed, seeing that the nine days were not much more than half over.
Mr. Tompkins then told the following short and simple story, which was written down upon the spot by the only person present who had a lead-pencil:—
There was once a hen who talked about another hen in a not very good way, and in a not at all friendly way. The hen she talked about was named Phe-endy Alome. Her own name was Teedla Toodlum. They both belonged to a flock of white hens which lived in the far-away country of Chickskumeatyourkornio.
Now, the one that was named Teedla Toodlum went around among the other hens, making fun of Phe-endy Alome on account of her having a speckled feather in her wing. She told them not to go with Phe-endy Alome, or scratch up worms with her, or any thing, because Phe-endy had that speckled feather in her wing.
One of the hens that Teedla Toodlum talked to in this way was deaf, and therefore could not hear very well. She had become deaf in consequence of not minding her mother. It happened in this way: A tall Shanghai roost-cock crowed close to her ear when she was quite small; when, in fact, she was just hatched out of her shell. She had a number of brothers and sisters who came out at almost the same time. The Shanghai stood very near, and in such a way that his throat came close to the nest, and he crowed there. The chicks wanted to put their heads out from under their mother, and see who was making such a noise. Their mother said,—
“No, no, no! Keep under! You might be made deaf: I’ve heard of such a thing happening.”
But one chick did put her head out, and close to the Shanghai’s wide-open throat too, and when he was crowing terribly.
Then her mother said,—
“Now I shall punish you: I shall prick you with my pin-feathers.”
And the chick was pricked, and she became deaf besides; so that, when she grew up, she hardly could hear herself cackle. And this was the reason she could not understand very well when the hen named Teedla Toodlum was telling the others that the hen named Phe-endy Alome had a speckled feather in her wing.
One day, the hen named Teedla Toodlum scratched a hole in the sand beneath a bramble-bush, and sat down there, where it was cool; and, while she was sitting there, a cow came along at the other side of the bramble-bush, with a load of “passengers” on her back. The cows in the country of Chickskumeatyourkornio permit the hens to ride on their backs; and, when a great many are on, they step carefully, so as not to shake them off. In frosty weather they allow them to get up there to warm their feet. Sometimes hens who have cold feet fly up and push off the others who have been there long enough.
The cow passed along at the other side of the bush, and by slipping one foot into a deep hole which was hidden with grass, and therefore could not be seen, upset the whole load of passengers. She then walked on; but the passengers staid there, and had a little talk together,—after their own fashion, of course. The deaf one happened to be among them; and, seeing that the others were having great sport, she wanted to know what it was all about. Upon this the others—those of them who could stop laughing—raised their voices; and all began at once to try to make her understand. And this is what they said:—
“Think of that goose of a hen, Teedla Toodlum, telling us not to go with Phe-endy Alome because Phe-endy Alome has a speckled feather in her wing, when at the same time Teedla Toodlum has two speckled feathers in her own wing, but doesn’t know it!
Teedla Toodlum was listening, and heard rather more than was pleasant to hear. She looked through the bramble-bush, and saw them. Some had their heads thrown back, laughing; some were holding on to their sides, each with one claw; and some were stretching their necks forward, trying to make the deaf one understand, while the deaf one held her claw to her ear in order to hear the better.
“Ah, I feel ashamed!” said Teedla Toodlum to herself. “I see now that one should never speak of the speckled feathers one sees in others, since one can never be sure that one has not speckled feathers one’s self.”
“Why, that’s the way our cow does!” cried the Jimmyjohns as soon as Mr. Tompkins had finished.
“What! talks about speckled feathers?” asked cousin Floy.
“No: lets hens stay on her back.”
“Her parents, or grandparents, or great-grandparents, then,” said Mr. Tompkins, “probably came from Chickskumeatyourkornio.”