The Little Red Hen 1
A Little Red Hen lived in a barnyard.
She spent almost all of her time walking about the barnyard in her
picketty-pecketty fashion, scratching
everywhere for
worms.
She dearly loved fat, delicious worms and felt they were absolutely necessary to the health of her children. As often as she found a worm she would call "Chuck-chuck-chuck!" to her chickies.
When they were gathered about her, she would
distribute choice morsels of her tid-bit. A busy
little body was she!
A cat usually napped lazily in the barn door, not even
bothering herself to scare the rat who ran here and
there as he pleased. And as for the pig who lived in
the sty – he did not care what happened so long as he
could eat and grow fat.
One day the Little Red Hen found a Seed. It was
a Wheat Seed, but the Little Red Hen was so
accustomed to bugs and worms that she supposed
this to be some new and perhaps very delicious
kind of meat. She bit it gently and found that
it resembled a worm in no way whatsoever as
to taste although because it was long and slender,
a Little Red Hen might easily be fooled by its
appearance.
Carrying it about, she made many inquiries as to
what it might be. She found it was a Wheat Seed
and that, if planted, it would grow up and when ripe
it could be made into flour and then into bread.
When she discovered that, she knew it ought to
be planted. She was so busy hunting food for
herself and her family that, naturally, she
thought she ought not to take time to plant it.
So she thought of the Pig - upon whom time
must hang heavily and of the Cat who had
nothing to do, and of the great fat Rat with
his idle hours, and she called loudly:
"Who will plant the Seed?"
But the Pig said, "Not I," and the Cat said,
"Not I," and the Rat said, "Not I."
"Well, then," said the Little Red Hen, "I will."
And she did.
Then she went on with her daily duties through
the long summer days, scratching for worms and
feeding her chicks, while the Pig grew fat, and
the Cat grew fat, and the Rat grew fat, and
the Wheat grew tall and ready for harvest.
So one day the Little Red Hen chanced to notice
how large the Wheat was and that the grain was
ripe, so she ran about calling briskly: "Who will
cut the Wheat?"
The Pig said, "Not I," the Cat said, "Not I,"
and the Rat said, "Not I."
"Well, then," said the Little Red Hen, "I will."
And she did.
She got the sickle from among the farmer's
tools in the barn and proceeded to cut off all
of the big plant of Wheat.
On the ground lay the nicely cut Wheat, ready
to be gathered and threshed, but the newest
and yellowest and downiest of Mrs. Hen's chicks
set up a "peep-peep-peeping" in their most
vigorous fashion, proclaiming to the world at
large, but most particularly to their mother,
that she was neglecting them.
To be continued...