WINNING FIRST PRIZE
Henrietta Hen was waiting as patiently as she could for the fair to cometo an end. She tried to close her ears to the boasts of her neighbors oneither side of her, that they were going to win the first prize. She hadheard too many unpleasant remarks about herself to have even theslightest hope of winning any prize at all--let alone the first.
"Anyhow, we'll be going home tonight," Henrietta said to herself. "AndI'll never, never, never come to another fair. I'll go and hide 'way uphigh in the haymow where they can't find me before I'll spend anotherweek in a place like this."
While she was muttering under her breath like that some men came up toher pen. And Henrietta Hen promptly squatted down in the furthest cornerof it, hoping they wouldn't say anything disagreeable about her. She feltthat she had already heard about all she could stand. She didn't evenlook at her callers. And soon they moved away.
Then Henrietta glanced up. She noticed something blue dangling from thefront of her pen. And there was a greater commotion than ever on allsides of her.
"What is it?" she cried. "What has happened?"
Neighbor Number 1, on her right, shot a spiteful look at her.
"Those stupid judges!" she spluttered. "They've made a terrible blunder.They've gone and given you and your chicks the first prize. And of courseit was meant for me and mine!"
"It wasn't!" screamed Neighbor Number 2 (on Henrietta's left). "Thatprize was intended for me and my children!"
"Who won second and third?" cried a noisy hen from across the way.
"They're both at the other end of the hall!" somebody shrieked.
"It's an outrage! It isn't fair! We've been cheated!" Henrietta Hen'snearest neighbors clamored. But nobody paid any attention to them.
As for Henrietta, she didn't quite know how to act. She had intended,when she left home, to do a good deal of strutting back and forth in herpen, with now and then a pause to preen herself, to make sure that shelooked her best. But somehow she no longer cared to put on grand airs, asof old. She remembered that some of the other hens at the fair had beenhaughty and proud and had smoothed their feathers, declaring boldly thatthey expected to win the first prize.
Henrietta had heard it said that fine feathers don't make fine birds. Andshe knew at last what that meant. It meant that gay clothes and loftyways and boastful talk were of no account at all.
So Henrietta tried to behave as if nothing unusual had happened. She toldher chicks that they were going home that evening, and that she would beglad to be back on the farm again, among plain home-folks.
At last Johnnie Green and his father came to load Henrietta and herfamily into the wagon.
"Well," said the old horse Ebenezer to Henrietta. "Did you enjoy theraces?"
"I didn't have a chance to see them," she replied.
"That's a pity," he told her. And then he asked her, "What's that bluetag hanging from your pen?"
"That--" said Henrietta--"that means that my chicks won the first prize."
"She helped win it herself," cried old dog Spot, who was yelping aboutthe wagon. "Our little speckled hen was the best hen at the fair!"
"Nonsense!" Henrietta exclaimed. But, all the same, she couldn't helpbeing pleased.
THE END.
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