Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1915-11-07
THE HEN.
BY DIR. FRANK CRANE.
Copyright. 1850
7 sing of the hen.

| 7 sing of the hen.
| No. not the Orpington or Plymouth
Rock or any fancy-frizzled, feather-leg
ged sort of prize fowl, but just the
plain, ordinary, everyday hen, that
walks around and clucks and paws the
ground, perks her head with howdy-
do every step, runs right in front of the
automobile and occasionally sneaks off
into the brush and lays an egg.
| 1 met a man the other day that had
just got back from Turkey. He had
got into Scrape, along with three
other Americans, somewhere up around
| Harpoot, which is some days camel
ride from the ways and means of civil
liked transportation.
I'VE were in prison. he said. Smith
ers had punched big Turk in the nose
because he didn't like his face, and also
because Smithers was considerably lit
up with some sort of heather strong
drink.
1t proved to be a Turk of conse
quence, one of the high-muck "a -mucks
of the community. and we were in for
It, We put up a grand fight, but it was
no use. The guards swarmed US and
soon laid US by the heels.
I'VE were thrown into prison. A dirt
Ter hole does not exist this side of the
bitches of Gehenna. To all of which
was added the assurance that soon
as the sun rose in all his glory next
morning we were to be taken out and
stood against a wall and eXeunt omnes.
I'VE got through the night somehow.
1t was bad and long one, yet ! can't
say we were in a hurry for sun-up.
But by and by it came, boiling up in
a n unclouded sky, as pleasant as though
extinction of four perfectly good
Americans.
There was a little barred window 1
was looking out at it. No glass, you
know, just hole. And suddenly / saw
la sight and heard a sound that knocked
me.
Il just gave one wild yelp and turned
Iaround, covered my face with my hand
and beloved like baby.
what the -" they exclaimed all,
and came crowding up to the window
to see.
TT wasn't Old Glory floating from a
pole, or a British gunboat riding in
the offing, or bagpipe playing The
Camerons Are Coming
81 have heard that there are soul-stir-
ring sights and so on to dying men.
Maybe
But what I saw was just an old hen
looking around for worm. And what
heard was her 'cut-cut-cut. outlaw
CUT
We'll, sir, it Topped me back twenty
years in minute. l saw dad going out
with his milk pail to the barn, and
mother scattering handfuls of corn to
and before I knew it 1 was numbering.
Who'd ever have thought they have
hens in Turkey? Of course, come to
think of it, why shouldn't they? But
we had been for weeks among foreign
ers, with gibberish languages and
fuzzy-wuzzy customs. and felt out of
the world-piumb.
and that blamed old speckled hen
just brought me back to earth so swift
it knocked the breath out of me.
That's all. They didn't kill US, or l
wouldn't be here. We fixed it up with
the old Turk and got away.
But to my dying day I'll never forget
the shock that old hen gave me.
"She was the humanest thing I'd seen.
She was humaner than humanity.
Did YOU ever think how blamed hu-
man a hen is? Wherever you go, Eu,
rome, Irope and Stirrup. there you ind
old Mrs. Hen, and she's just the same
old common greens she was in dads
i've never eaten chicken since, by the
way It's all right for them that like
but I'd as soon think of eating my
mother"