"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 course
it was meant for me and mine!"

"It wasn't!" screamed Neighbor Number 2 (on Henrietta's left). "That
prize 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's
nearest 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 her
pen, with now and then a pause to preen herself, to make sure that she
looked her best. But somehow she no longer cared to put on grand airs, as
of old. She remembered that some of the other hens at the fair had been
haughty and proud and had smoothed their feathers, declaring boldly that
they expected to win the first prize.

Henrietta had heard it said that fine feathers don't make fine birds. And
she knew at last what that meant. It meant that gay clothes and lofty
ways and boastful talk were of no account at all.