mother looked behind his ears and said: "Why you are just as afraid of the
water as the chickens."

Did you ever hear of such a thing!

Now the chickens have _second_ cousins too. Their second cousins are
the white geese.

They live on the other side of the tall fence that looks as if it were made
of crocheted wire. Sometimes Jehosophat's father opens the gate in the
fence and lets the geese wander down to the pond. A silly way they have
of stretching out their long white necks and crying, "Hiss, hiss!" This
frightens Hepzebiah who always runs away. Then the geese waddle along in
single file, that is one by one, like fat old ladies crossing a muddy
street on their way to sewing society.

Jehosophat says that the chickens have third cousins too,--the swans. There
they are, way out on the pond, sailing along like white ships. Their necks
are very long and snowy white and they bend in such a pretty way. And their
soft white wings look something like the wings of the angels on the
Christmas cards.

Jehosophat, Marmaduke, and Hepzebiah do not like one barnyard neighbour
very much. It is the guinea-hen. She has a grey body, plump as a sack of
meal, with little white speckles, a funny neck and such a small head with a
tuft on top. She screeches horribly and Marmaduke calls her "Miss
Crosspatch."

But the turkey with his proud walk is just funny. And yet Farmer Green says
he hasn't any sense of humour. Ask _your_ father how that can be if he