Tales of a Poultry Farm

by Clara Dillingham Pierson

  THE GUINEA-FOWLS COME AND GO

  It was only a few days after the Young Cock had been carried away bythe Eagle, that the Man drove back from town with a very queer lookupon his face. A small crate in the back end of the light wagoncontained three odd-looking fowls. The Little Girls left their mudpies and ran toward the wagon. When they saw the crate, they ran intothe house and called their mother to come out also.

  "What have you now?" said she, as she stepped onto the side porch.

  "Guinea-fowls," answered the Man. "Just listen to this letter." Hedrew it from his pocket and read aloud: "I send you, by express, aGuinea-Cock and two Guinea-Hens. They were given to me, and I have noplace for keeping them. I remember hearing that they are excellentfor scaring away Crows, so I send them on in the hope that they may beuseful to you. If you do not wish to keep them, do what you choosewith them."

  As he read three small and perfectly bald heads were thrust throughthe openings of the crate and turned and twisted until their ownershad seen everything around. "I don't know anything aboutGuinea-fowls," said the Man, "but I will at least keep these longenough to find out. I have seen the Crows fly down and annoy the Hensseveral times, and it may be that these are just what we need."

  He took the crate down and opened it carefully. The three fowls thatwalked out looked almost exactly alike. All had very smooth and softcoats of black feathers covered with small round white spots. Theywere shaped quite like Turkeys, but were much smaller, with gray-brownlegs, and heads which were not feathered at all. The skin of theirfaces and necks was red, and they had small wattles at the corners oftheir mouths. Bristle-like feathers stood out straight around theupper part of their necks, and below these were soft gray featherswhich covered the neck and part of the chest. They walked directlytoward the barnyard, where some of the farm fowls were picking up anearly dinner. "Ca-mac!" said they "Ca-mac! Ca-mac! We want some too."

  Now the farm fowls were not especially polite, not having come of finefamilies or been taught good manners when they were Chickens, yet theydid not at all like to have newcomers speak to them in this way. Theynoticed it all the more, because when the White Plymouth Rocks camethey had acted so very differently. They stepped a little to one side,giving the Guinea-fowls enough room in which to scratch and pickaround as they had been doing, but they did not say much to them.

  The Gobbler was strutting back and forth among the smaller fowls. Hedisliked living with them as much as he had to now, but the HenTurkeys would have nothing to say to him because he annoyed theirChicks. They went off with their children and left him alone, and, ashe wanted company of some sort, he took what he could get. He thoughtit might be a good plan to make friends with the Guinea-fowls.

  "Good-morning," said he. "Have you come here to stay?"

  "We shall stay if we like it," answered the Guinea-Cock. "We always dowhat we like best."

  "Humph!" said the Shanghai Cock to himself. "Remarkable fowls! Wonderwhat the Man will think about that."

  "I hope you will like it," said the Gobbler, who was so lonely that hereally tried hard to be agreeable. "I understand quite how you feelabout doing as you like. I always prefer to do what I prefer."

  "We _do_ it," remarked one of the Guinea-Hens, as she chased the BrownHen away from the spot where she had been feeding, and swallowed a fatWorm which the Brown Hen had just uncovered.

  "Yes," said the other Guinea-Hen, "I guess we are just as good asanybody else."

  "Is there plenty to eat here?" asked the Guinea-Cock.

  "Plenty," answered the Gobbler. "It is much better than it used to be.There is a new Man here, and he takes better care of his fowls thanthe Farmer did. He doesn't carry red handkerchiefs either."

  "I don't care what kind of handkerchiefs he carries," said theGuinea-Cock. "What makes you talk about such things?"

  "You would know what makes me speak of them if you were a Gobbler,"was the answer. "I cannot bear red things. I cannot even eat my corncomfortably when anything red is around. You see it is quiteimportant. Anything which spoils a fellow's fun in eating isimportant."

  "Nothing would spoil my fun if I had the right sort of food," remarkedthe Guinea-Cock. Then he turned to the Guinea-Hens. "Come," he said."We have eaten enough. Let us walk around and see the place."

  All three started off, walking along where-ever they chose, andstopping to feed or to talk about what they saw. Anybody could tell bylooking at them that they were related to the Turkeys, but the Gobblerhad not cared to remind them of that. He was looking for more companyduring the time when his own family left him so much alone. He knewthat before very long the Turkey Chicks would be too large to fearhim, and that when that time came, their mothers and they would bewilling to walk with him. Then he would have less to do with the otherpoultry, and might not want three bad-mannered Guinea-fowl cousinstagging along after him.

  Whenever the three met another fowl, they talked about him and saidexactly what they thought, and if they passed a Hen who had just founda choice bit of food, they chased her away and ate it themselves.Sometimes they even chased fowls who were not in their way and whowere not eating things that they wanted. It seemed as though they hadsimply made up their minds to do what they wanted to do, whenever andwherever they wished. They did not make much fuss about it, and if youhad seen them when they were doing none of these mean things, youwould have thought them very genteel. You would never have suspectedthat they could act as they did.

  The Gander and the Geese passed near the Guinea-fowls and theGuinea-fowls did not chase them. They were not foolish enough to annoypeople so much larger than they. It is true that the Hens were largerthan they, yet the Guinea-fowls could make them run every time. Ifthey had troubled the Geese, it might have ended with the Guinea-fowlsdoing the running. And the Guinea-fowls were cowards. They would neverquarrel with people unless they were sure of beating.

  "S-s-s-s-s-s-s!" said the Gander. "Are we to have that sort of peopleon this farm? If we are, I would rather live somewhere else. I do notsee why there should be any disagreeable people anyway."

  "There should not be," said the Geese, who always agreed witheverything the Gander said, and who really believed as he did aboutthis. "Disagreeable people should be sent away, or eaten up, orsomething."

  Both the Gander and the Geese thought themselves exceedinglyagreeable, and so they were--when everything suited them. At othertimes they were often quite cross. Many people act like this, and seemto think it very sweet of them not to be cross all the time. Trulyagreeable people, as you very well know, are those who can keeppleasant when things go wrong.

  "Ca-mac!" said the three Guinea-fowls together. "There are some ofthose stupid Geese, who are always walking around and eating grassthat is too short for anybody else. They eat grass, and grow feathersfor Farmers' Wives to pluck off. When we have gone to the trouble ofgrowing a fine coat of feathers, we keep them as long as we wish, andthen they drop out, a few at a time. If anybody wants our feathers, hemust follow around after us and pick them up."

  Before night came, the Guinea-fowls had met and annoyed nearly all thepoultry on the place. They had even made dashes at the smallestChickens and frightened them dreadfully. The Man had been too busy tosee much of the trouble that they made, but his Little Girls noticedit, for they had been watching the Guinea-fowls and hoping to findsome of their beautiful spotted feathers lying around. When the LittleGirls were eating their supper of bread and milk, they told theirfather about it.

  "They walk around and look too good for anything," said thebrown-haired one, "but whenever they get a chance they chase the Hensand the Chickens."

  "Yes," said the golden-haired Little Girl, "I even saw one of themscare the Barred Plymouth Rock Hen, the one who ate bread and saltwith you."

  "That is very bad," said the Man, gravely. "Any fowl that troubles theBarred Plymouth Rock Hen must be punished."

  "What will you do to them?" asked the golden-haired Little Girl. "Ithink you will have to shut them up. You couldn't spank the
m, couldyou? Not even if you wanted to ever so much."

  "I shall decide to-night how to punish them," said the Man, "and thenin the morning we will see about it." When he spoke he did not knowhow much time he would spend in thinking about the Guinea-fowls thatnight.

  When it was time for them to go to roost, the Guinea-fowls flutteredand hopped upward until they reached quite a high branch in theapple-tree by the Man's chamber window. Then, instead of going tosleep for the night, as one would think they would wish to do, theytook short naps and awakened from time to time to visit with eachother. It is true that they had seen much that was new during the day,and so had more than usual to talk about, but this was really noexcuse, because they had the habit of talking much at night and wouldhave been nearly as noisy if nothing at all had happened.

  The Man was just going to sleep when they awakened from one of theirnaps and began to chat. "Ca-mac! Ca-mac!" said one. "I suppose thosestupid fowls in the poultry-house are sound asleep, with their headstucked under their wings. What do you think of the company here?"

  "Good enough," said another. "I don't like any of them very much, butyou can't expect Geese and Ducks to be Guinea-fowls. We don't have totalk to them. The Gobbler is trying to be agreeable, and when the HenTurkeys can think of any thing besides their children we may find themgood company."

  "It is a good thing that there are so many Hens here," said the third."The Man throws out their grain and then we can scare them away andeat all we want of it. What fun it is to see Hens run when they arefrightened!"

  After this short visit they went to sleep again, and so did the Man.But they went to sleep much more quickly than he did, and he was verytired and disliked being disturbed in that way. He had just fallenasleep when one of the Guinea-Hens awakened again. "Ca-mac!" said sheto the others. "Ca-mac! Ca-mac! I have thought of something to say.How do you like the idea of living on this place?"

  "We like it," answered the Guinea-Cock and the other Guinea-Hen. Thenthey went on to tell why they liked it. They said that there were nochildren of the stone-throwing kind, no Dog, and no Cat. They hadplenty of room for the long walks which they liked to take, and therewere many chances to get the food which the Man threw out. When theyhad spoken of all these things the Guinea-Cock said: "It is decidedthen that we will stay here instead of running away to another farm.This is a good enough place for any fowl. Now let us take anothernap."

  While they were thinking this, the Man was thinking something quitedifferent. In the morning while the Guinea-fowls were eating grainwhich had been strewn in one of the yards, the Man closed the gate,and, helped by the Little Girls, drove the three Guinea-fowls into acorner and caught them. Then he put them into the crate in which theyhad come, and took them across the road to the Farmer who lived there.

  When this was done there were many happy people left behind on thepoultry-farm. The Little Girls were happy, because they had found fourfeathers which the Guinea-fowls lost in trying to get away from theMan. The Hens were happy, because they could now be more sure ofeating the food which they found. The other poultry were glad to thinkthat they would not have to listen to new-comers saying such dreadfulthings about them, and perhaps the Man, when he came back, was thehappiest of all. "I gave them to the Farmer over there," he said, "andhe will give them to a poor family far away. I have stopped keepingGuinea-fowls to scare away the Crows. I would rather keep Crows toscare away the Guinea-fowls, but I think we can get along verycomfortably without either." And the poultry thought so too.