The Golden Bird

spitable, answer in two return questions to my anxious inqu

an, didn't you

or twenty-odd years, isn't it?" As he spoke Uncle Cradd beamed on father, who was eating with the first show of real pleasure in food since

dd," answered father as he took a second muffin. "I know that Lamb us

father disappear into the eighteenth century," I pleaded, as I hande

e as he peered at me over his glasses. "Upon my word, William, Nancy is the living im

aware of what I was saying; "but I want to

n Harpeth Valley ever since. He never eats or sleeps anywhere, and he's a kind of wizard with animals, they say. And, Willi

age heads in January, he did," said Rufus, as he rolled his big black eyes and mysteriously shook his old head with its white kinks. "No physi

I picked up in London last year. The dealer was a robber, and my d

the Cantri

nd I wa

ommuned with my own self while father and

se together on a wonderful old mahogany table before the fire, one of the dignified chairs drawn up on each sid

thing I want to look up in my chicken book," I said before I seate

add, coming and taking my face into his long, lean old hands. "God bless you, my dear, and keep you in His care here in the home of your forefathers. Good-night!" After

was very near, if not quite, five feet high, beside which were steps for the purposes of ascension. All the rest of the room was in a blur of lavender-scented darkness, and I only saw that both side walls folded down and were lit with the deep old gables, through the open windows of which young moon rays were struggling to help light the situation for me. As I looked at that wide, puffy old bed, with a blur of soft colors in its quilt and the va

cation of Uncle Cradd, and that is all I knew after the first delicious sink and soft huddling

ting up in a billowed softness, while moonlight of a different color was sifting in through the gable windows and the most lovely calling notes were coming in on its beams. Without a moment's hesitation I answered in about six notes of that Delilah song whic

tub bound together with brass rims, whirled my black mop into a knot, slipped into the modish boots, co

the barn as I peered about, and a mist was rolling away from between

wer I got was from the Golden Bird, who sent a long, triumphant,

that I had been only half dreaming about my early morning opera. Pan had come and gone. Upon t

ing inside and out. Put in clean hay. Dust all the beauties on their heads and under their wings with wood ashes in which you put a little of the powder you'll find in a piece of this paper in t

d

with outspread white wings that were handled with the height of awkwardness. "But I'll do it all if it kills me," I added, with my head up, as I began to scatter some of the big white grains that I knew to be corn and which, by lifting lids and pee

ng about my feet that I prolonged the process of the feeding by scattering only a few grains at a time until

re, they didn't," came Rufus's voice in solemn words of apology uttered in tones of serious reproof. As he spoke he stood as far from the door of the feed-room as poss

so am I," I answered him with dignity. "Call me

until after ten o'clock. They's gentlemen, they is." The tones of his voice were

me a-a hammer and some nails. Also a bucket of whitewash," I said

and with such dignity in his mien that it was pathetic. I was merciful while I consumed the meal which was an exact repetition of the suppe

he living-room fire out at the barn for me, R

e of cold despair. It was thus that the feu

discovered the hour to be exactly seven-thirty, and I felt that I had what would seem like a week ahead of me before the setting of the sun. However, I was wrong in my judgment, for time fairly fled

ght from the door. I looked up and, behold, Mrs. Silas Beesley loomed up against the sun and seemed to shine with equal refulgence t

g at the Craddock family estate pretty early in the action though it's none too soon, and mighty glad I am to see you do it while there is still a little odd lumber left. I've always said that it's women folks that p

I laid down my dull-toothed instrument for the dissection of th

e produce more than any one else in the river bend got off of fifty. Nobody can take the house, because it is hitched on to you with entailment, and though the croppers have skimmed off all the cream of the land, the clay botto

and Uncle Cradd assured us that-that there was plenty for us all at Elmnest," I said

one-such chickens that you must have been bringing a silk purse sewed with gold thread with you. I said to Silas as he put out the lamp last night, 'The good Lord may let His deliverance horses lag along the track, but He always dri

ather gave up everything, and I sold my clothes and the cars to buy back his library a

ed in the way of two loud cacklings from the feed-room and the most ringing and triumphant crow that I am sure ever issued from the throat of a thoroughbred cock. "'T

scratched nests beside the bin over which two of the very most lovely white Leghorn ladies were proudly standing and clucking, while between them Mr. G. Bird was crowing with

ss the Lord, Honeybunch. Pick 'e

n of the smock over my breast in which my heart was beating high with excitement. And as I held them there all thre

. I'll lend you the first one of mine that broods," said Mrs. Silas as she took both the beautiful treas

rtisement for the mechanical hen which I had answered with thirty-five dollars obtained from the sale of the last fluffy petticoat I had hoped to retain, but which I gave up gladly after reading the advertisement. Two most lovely c

make very much better mothers," reproved Aunt Mary, with sweet firmness. "Just you wait and see which brings out your prize birds, the wooden box or the hen. When men invent some

and start father and Uncle Cradd off with the biscuits while I fi

time to make my water waves and offer daily prayer!" And with this ejaculation of good-natured indignation, evidently at the memory of sundry and various poultry prods, Mrs. Silas betook herself to the house with a beautif

cent already," she called b

she is the mistress of a lilac bush. Neither her début dance nor her first proposal of sentiment equals

nd took up the saw to again attack the odds and ends of old plank I had collected on the barn floor. "If I can make one nest in two hours, I can make two more in four more, and then I w