“What a pretty day this is!” said the old gray goose to the brown hen, as they stood at the henhouse window and watched the falling snow which covered every nook and corner of the farmyard.

“Yes, indeed,” said the brown hen; “I would be almost willing to be made into chicken pie on such a day.”

She had scarcely stopped talking, when the Pekin duck said, fretfully, “I am dreadfully hungry,” and a little flock of speckled chickens all huddled together wailed in sad chorus, “And we’re so thirsty!”

In fact, the feathered folks in the henhouse were very much inclined to be cross and discontented. 174Since the farmer’s boy fed them, early in the morning, they had been given nothing to eat or drink, and, as hour after hour went by, and the cold winter wind howled around their house, it is no wonder they felt deserted.

The handsome white rooster, however, appeared quite as happy as usual, and that is saying a great deal, for a jollier, better-natured old fellow than he never graced a farmyard. Sunshine, rain, or snow were all the same to him, and he crowed quite as lustily in stormy weather as in fair.

“Well,” he said, laughing heartily, as his bright eyes glanced about the henhouse, “you all seem to be having a fit of the dumps.”

Nobody answered the white rooster, but a faint cluck or two came from some hens who immediately put their heads back under their wings, as if ashamed of having spoken at all.

This was quite too much for the white rooster, who, standing first on one yellow foot and then on the other, said: “Well, we are a 175lively set! Anyone would think, to look in here, that we were surrounded by a band of hungry foxes.”

Just then a daring little white bantam rooster hopped down from his perch, and, strutting pompously over to the big rooster, created quite a stir among the feathered folk by saying,

“We’re all lively enough when our crops are full, but when we’re starving the wonder is that we can hold our heads up at all. If I ever see that farmer’s boy again, I’ll—I’ll peck his foot!”

“You won’t see him until he feeds us,” said the white rooster, “and then I think you will peck his corn.”

“Oh, oh!” moaned the brown hen, “don’t ............