The sun was shining high in the sky on a bright Sunday morning. The chickens on Sunny Farm were coming out of their roost and scratching for their breakfast.
“My dear Poultry Friends,” said a smooth, cunning voice, “why do you not come and visit me? I am giving a breakfast this lovely morning to you and all the other families in the neighborhood. It is such a long time since we met, and I should so enjoy entertaining all of you, my cherished friends. And I promise you the most delectable breakfast you ever had.”
It was Fiona the Fox who had come to visit them, looking quite neat and trim as she ran in and out among the trees.
“Oh, that is a kind invitation,” said the hens on the right; “surely we ought to accept it.”
“But I hear that Margaret Decoy and her children are having a banquet this morning,” said the hens on the left.
“It is very kind of you and very good of us to accept your invitation,” said the Black Minorca. “But is it wise? I have heard it said that there is a Fox about our neighborhood who has tried to get up chicken breakfasts in order to lead unfortunate fowls to the slaughter.”
“Nonsense!” said Fiona; “he is a miserable deceiver who tries to set farmer against farmer by spreading such stories about us. Come, come! Tell your people to be ready and send me word how many of you will come.”
So the hens went to their farmers and ladies. “Do you approve?” they asked.
“By all means,” was the reply. And so they set off in a body to the place appointed for their meeting.
“What a pity,” said Fiona, looking around, “that a chicken banquet should have been fixed for this very same time. Never mind; one or two will not be missed.”
And seizing Old Gentile, the last of them, she made a hearty breakfast. But as she was about to treat herself to a second helping she saw the farmer approaching and went away.
The next morning the same scene took place. “How do you do, my dear friends,” said Fiona. “I left a number of you yesterday uninvited to my repast. Today I want you all to come and not to keep them waiting.”
“They will be sure to be here,” said the hens; and they came, the hen that had lost her chicks going with the best of them.
“It is a thousand pities,” said Fiona, “that a chicken banquet should be fixed for today. How are they to have time?”
And she made a hearty breakfast and went her way. Then, and not till then, the English hen took courage to say to her companions:
“Fowls, we have an enemy whom we have trusted, and who by her treachery has slept in our housing, not to do us good, but to devise our injury. From this time let us be united against the common foe.”
And so they went to their farmers and strict watch was kept to prevent the Fox entering the roost.
“Chickens are not such simpletons as they look,” said Fiona to herself. But she bore a grudge to the crafty fowls, and waited her time.
One dark night Fiona went by, and said without to the farm-wife: “Hah, the poultry is always crying out against me!!” And with that she stole the cat away. Soon after she returned and set up a loud piteous wailing.
Then Hen came to the side of the coop, and cried:
“Oh, who is calling in such sorrow to me? Have pity, dear madam, and tell me what you want.”
“It is I, your dear mistress, do not you know me?” said the cat.
“Oh yes,” replied Hen, “you say true; I believe you are our dear mistress. But we don’t feel sure. Do you remember lately what you ate, and where you found it? Pray tell us so that we may feel sure that it is you.”
“I will not speak a word, as I hope to be saved from this Fox, who is my great enemy, but of what took place till I was fifteen months old, and when I ate that quantity of live chickens, which caused your merry friends yesterday to have a funeral.”
“Ah Yes, yes, yes,” cried Hen, turning tail and calling out to the others. “That’s quite enough: now we know you quite well, and what is more, we will now know you no longer, for you are a bad character and unworthy of the name of Hen.”