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1、【英文读物】Queer Little FolksHEN THAT HATCHED DUCKS. A STORY. Once there was a nice young hen that we will call Mrs. Feathertop. She was a hen of most excellent family, being a direct descendant of the Bolton Grays, and as pretty a young fowl as you could wish to see of a summers day. She was, moreover,
2、as fortunately situated in life as it was possible for a hen to be. She was bought by young Master Fred Little John, with four or five family connections of hers, and a lively young cock, who was held to be as brisk a scratcher and as capable a head of a family as any half-dozen sensible hens could
3、desire. I cant say that at first Mrs. Feathertop was a very sensible hen. She was very pretty and lively, to be sure, and a great favourite with Master Bolton Gray Cock, on account of her bright eyes, her finely shaded feathers, and certain saucy dashing ways that she had which seemed greatly to tak
4、e his fancy. But old Mrs. Scratchard, living in the neighbouring yard, assured all the neighbourhood that Gray Cock was a fool for thinking so much of that flighty young thing; that she had not the smallest notion how to get on in life, and thought of nothing in the world but her own pretty feathers
5、. “Wait till she comes to have chickens,” said Mrs. Scratchard; “then you will see. I have brought up ten broods myselfas likely and respectable chickens as ever were a blessing to societyand I think I ought to know a good hatcher and brooder when I see her; and I know that fine piece of trumpery, w
6、ith her white feathers tipped with gray, never will come down to family life. She scratch for chickens! Bless me, she never did anything in all her days but run round and eat the worms which somebody else scratched up for her.” When Master Bolton Gray heard this he crowed very loudly, like a cock of
7、 spirit, and declared that old Mrs. Scratchard was envious, because she had lost all her own tail-feathers, and looked more like a worn-out old feather-duster than a respectable hen, and that therefore she was filled with sheer envy of anybody that was young and pretty. So young Mrs. Feathertop cack
8、led gay defiance at her busy rubbishy neighbour, as she sunned herself under the bushes on fine June afternoons. Now Master Fred Little John had been allowed to have these hens by his mamma on the condition that he would build their house himself, and take all the care of it; and to do Master Fred j
9、ustice, he executed the job in a small way quite creditably. He chose a sunny sloping bank covered with a thick growth of bushes, and erected there a nice little hen-house with two glass windows, a little door, and a good pole for his family to roost on. He made, moreover, a row of nice little boxes
10、 with hay in them for nests, and he bought three or four little smooth white china eggs to put in them, so that, when his hens did lay, he might carry off their eggs without their being missed. This hen-house stood in a little grove that sloped down to a wide river, just where there was a little cov
11、e which reached almost to the hen-house. Erecting the Hen-House This situation inspired one of Master Freds boy advisers with a new scheme in relation to his poultry enterprise. “Hallo! I say, Fred,” said Tom Seymour, “you ought to raise ducks; youve got a capital place for ducks there.” “Yes; but I
12、ve bought hens, you see,” said Freddy; “so its no use trying.” “No use! Of course there is. Just as if your hens couldnt hatch ducks eggs. Now you just wait till one of your hens wants to sit, and you put ducks eggs under her, and youll have a family of ducks in a twinkling. You can buy ducks eggs a
13、 plenty of old Sam under the hill. He always has hens hatch his ducks.” So Freddy thought it would be a good experiment, and informed his mother the next morning that he intended to furnish the ducks for the next Christmas dinner and when she wondered how he was to come by them, he said mysteriously
14、, “Oh, I will show you how,” but did not further explain himself. The next day he went with Tom Seymour and made a trade with old Sam, and gave him a middle-aged jack-knife for eight of his ducks eggs. Sam, by-the-by, was a woolly-headed old negro man, who lived by the pond hard by, and who had long
15、 cast envying eyes on Freds jack-knife, because it was of extra fine steel, having been a Christmas present the year before. But Fred knew very well there were any number more of jack-knives where that came from, and that, in order to get a new one, he must dispose of the old; so he made the purchas
16、e and came home rejoicing. Now about this time Mrs. Feathertop, having laid her eggs daily with great credit to herself, notwithstanding Mrs. Scratchards predictions, began to find herself suddenly attacked with nervous symptoms. She lost her gay spirits, grew dumpish and morose, stuck up her feathers in a bristling way, and pecked at her neighbours if they did so much as look at her. Master Gray Cock was gre
