THREE LITTLE CHICKENS

Otago Witness, Issue 1419, 1 February 1879, Page 33

THREE LITTLE CHICKENS

(Written for the Children's Conic?'.) "Dear hio ! what is all that r.oiso ? I declaro, tlivr-e little cbickeun have Mlon into the sour milk tub. Kan, Janie, and help thorn out,"' Tlio kiud little girl bowi rcaohoil tiio tub,

took the chickens out, and gave them to their mother. But tho old hen did not think that thoße wet, dripping, little creatures were her chickens, and she would have no. thing to say to them. Janie took pity on the poor little things, wrapt them up in aoft flannel, and put them in a warm corner, near the fire. Janie woke early in the morning, and ran to look at the chickens ; she found that they were soft and downy, just as they were before they fell into the milk. So she took them to the old hen, who knew them quite well now they were dry. Their little brothers and sisters were so glad to see them that they gave them all the nicest crumbs and let them have the warmest place under mother's wings. When the old hen had made all her chicks comfortable, she said : " My dear children, where have you been ? Father and I have been so uneasy about you. Poor father never went to bed last night, he was so anxious. We thoughb the cats had caught you." " Well, mother," said the eldest of the three, " when you were talking to Mrs Duck yesterday, we slipped away, and went down the yard to the milk tub. All the young turkeys were sitting on the edge of the tub drinking, and one of them asked us to go up and have a drink, but we said no ; that mother would be angry. Then they laughed at us and said we were afraid. So, to show them we were not, we went up to drink and all fell in. The turkeys ran away gobbling, and we should all have been drowned had not a little girl found us. She knew whose children we were and brought ua to you, but we were so white with the milk that you did not know us, and we had caught such bad colds that we could not spe»k to tell you, bo the little girl took us, and put us near the fire, and this morning when we were dry she brought us to you. A Little Chicken. Palmerston.