Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1902-01-09
Tales of The Town.

1dleS OF 4ue 1OWu.
Hal Stephens secured a fine turkey
gobbler about Thanksgiving time and
although the bird was not as corpu-
lent as some of his kind that had been
better fed, still he was proud shiney
fellow and strutted around as good as
any of em. Day after day Hal would
go to his corn crib at rear Of Pat Mays
blacksmith shop and feed and admire
his gobblership and smack his lips in
anticipation of the good feast he was
expecting Christmas. The turkey
never suspected that Hal was intend
ing to pick his bones, and he soon
| made friends with his owner, and
every morning would gobble off few
bars of music to his lord and master
to notify him that it was time to eat.
A few days previous to Christmas,
when Mr.. Stephens went to his barn
to attend to his horses and feed the,
bird he listened long and patient
listen outside the building for the ia
miliar clutter of his gobblership, but
did MOI hear it, He meditated awhile
and made up his mind that some imp
had confscated his prize. Opening
the door of the cage he peered with
in, but it was vacant and upon furth-
er investigation some tell tale shoe
tracks gave additional light to the
awful story-the gobbler had been
stolen and there was no turkey for
Christmas; that is, no home fed tur-
key that could take the place of the
gobbler for which he had purchased
So worth of fed and spent $50 worth
of time in taking care Of for SO many
weeks. The turkey had left the roost
and gone to warmer chimes, and Hal,
downhearted and blue, came up town
and drank deeply, very deeply-even
to nerver, and said tearfully as he
turned away, - do not care SO much
about the loss of the turkey, but |
would give S. to know who was the
thief"
While looking over some poultry
literature the other day had another
cherished illusion of my youth
! knocked on the head. l had always
understood that china nest egg was
a necessary commodity of every self
respecting, egg-laying hen. But |
observed after reading the poultry
| journal that some meddling scientific
cuss had discovered at this late day
that a china egg in nest is always
of the same temperature as the atmos-
phere; hence when the thermometer
records zero the egg is also zero. The
temperature Of the body of hen is
about 1912 degrees, When hen goes
on nest to lay, and her body (the
naked .portion) comes in contact with
the ice cold substance, it is torture,
and she also loses heat and becomes
chilled. 1T does not pay, also said
this wise man from the east, ITO use
food for warming china nest eggs by
the hens. Cover them with white
flannel or some other material. So
there you are! The world has been
torturing hens these centuries with
china nest eggs, Biddy has been in
dustriously laying eggs unmindful of
the torture and all this time the world
went we'll. These scientific cusses do
make me tired.
Many men, many minds! While
one authority declares that an arti6c-
ial nest egg is an instrument of tor
ture for the hen another takes the op-
posite tack. 1t argues that one of
the causes of loss of customers and of
confidence on the part of those who
purchase strictly fresh eggs, is the
fact that an occasional nest egg will
find it's way into the egg basket.
While it is admitted that such an &C.
cident may happen and occur only
once, that once is sufficient to destroy
the reputation gained by years and
care, and the authority quoted puts
it's foot squarely on the proposition
that ''the nest egg should be artitic-
ial."