hen! And I don't think there wuz ever a more ironieler `hen' than
that wuz, or a scornfuller one."

"Why," sez I reasonably. "Hens are necessary and useful in any
position, both walkin' and settin', and layin'. You can't get'em
in any position hardly, but what they are useful and respectable,
only jest flyin'. Hens can't fly. Their wings haint shaped for
it. They look some like a dove's wings on the outside, the same
feathers, the same way of stretchin' 'em out. But there is
sunthin lackin' in 'em, some heaven-given capacity for soarin' an
for flight that the hens don't have. And it makes trouble, sights
and sights of trouble when hens try to fly, try to, and can't!

"At the same time it is hard for a dove to settle down in a back
yard and stay there, hard and tegus. She can and duz sometimes,
but never till after her wings have been clipped in some way.
Poor little dove! I am always sorry for 'em to see 'em a walkin'
round there, a wantin' to fly -- a not forgettin' how it seemed to
have their wings soarin' up through the clear sky, and the rush of
the pure liquid windwaves a sweepin' aginst 'em, as they riz up,
up, in freedom, and happiness, and glory. Poor little creeters.

"Yes, but doves can, if you clip their wings, settle down and
walk, but hens CAN'T fly, not for any length of time they can't.
No amount of stimulatin' poultices applied to the ends of their
tail feathers and wings can ever make 'em fly. They can't; it
haint their nater. They can make nests, and fill them with pretty
downy chicks, they can be happy and beautiful in life and mean;
they can spend their lives in jest as honerable and worthy a way
as if they wuz a flyin' round, and make a good honerable