The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1874-06-05
A Boys Ideas ON the Bird Called the
Chicken.

IA sohoo-boy's letter to the Louisville Courier
Journal
Most usually it takes two eggs for to
make a chicken, because, if you will put
eighteen eggs under a hen, only about
nine of EN- will hatch. A hen is so
careless and stubborn that most always
she won't cover her eggs all over, and
so they get chilled then they are ever
lastingly gone up. Also, the rats will
rob nest; so that, if you get half OF
a brood, it is a tol'able crop, and you
should be thankful. Then, | think, it
stands to reason this ought to prove
what | said at first A hen which has
got young family is more crosser than
ANYTHING else which can be compared
with her under the sun in the United
States. There never was a thing which
can ruflie its feathers up backwards and
rage worse than fool hen. A turkey
gobbler will do it, but he don't go off
INTO a red-hot passion about it, and
make fool of himself, and get enemies
all for nothing, like hen would. A
chicken III the spring time, which was
put to hatch in March, if it had good
luck and don't die of the pip, or gaps,
or cholera morbus, or get drowned or
something, will be big enough to sell
to the restaurant about in June. They
will fetch So a dozen, ana "a chicken is
more popular when 1T is spring chick
en- than if it would live long enough
to get as tough as Methuseler. They
say that n spring chicken is luxurious
thing for to broil and mix up with toast.
That's what I've heard. Once in a
great while we have spring chickens
tor dinner. Then we have the preach
er, or else some company, and 1 eat at
the secondhand table, and l can al
ways tell by the savory smell going on
in the kitchen that broiled chicken
ought to be good enough for anybody.
But If | don't get something to eat
more substantialler than a smell, | al
ways fall back on roast beef. A chick
Ell don't gather shrewdness like an owl,
and it never picks up any wisdom. 1t
is not talented thing like fox. If
you can show me more stupider thing
than hen, | wish you would trot her
out. The rooster has got what little
sense there ever was in the family. 1t
is one of the worst difficulties with a
chicken that she don't know its place
She won't stay III the barn-yard, where
she belongs, any way you can fix 1T. Ii
your mother has got flower beds in the
front yard-and It's mighty curious
mother which ain't-every last chicken
on the place will get in to scratch them,
if it takes till next Christmas and then
good-by to the hyacinthes, and Gro.
cuses, and jerryanthens, and all that
kind of ioolishness. Then is the time
that you want to have two jackets on,
or else to forget to come home early, If
it was you that left the lattice gate
open. Anyhow, that's my advice. AL
so, hen is hard-hearted and cruel,
and will kill every little desolated stray
chicken who tries to associate with her
own brood, and this is a good enough
reason why she is like a step-mother.
If hen once gets fair hold of little
chicken TO shake it by the nape of the
neck, it will never kick again in this
community more than twice. The fire.
quentest bad habit which hen has got
is going off to the neighbors to lay
also, it is too soft thing for the neigh.
bors; but 1t is generally chronic for a
hen to do it, and the only way to cure
her is to cut her head off and boil hel
down into soup. She won't go to the
neighbors to lay many times after that,
don't think.