selves the
trouble to make our acquaintance--not even any of the fowls, though we
are born to occupy a higher grade on the ladder than most of the rest.
But that does not disturb us: we quietly pursue our path amid the
others, whose principles are certainly not ours; for we look at things
on the favourable side, and only speak of what is good, though it is
difficult sometimes to find something when nothing exists. Except us
two and the cock, there's no one in the whole poultry-yard who is at
once talented and polite. It cannot even be said of the inhabitants of
the duck-yard. We warn you, little singing bird: don't trust that one
yonder with the short tail feathers, for she's cunning. The pied one
there, with the crooked stripes on her wings, is a strife-seeker, and
lets nobody have the last word, though she's always in the wrong. The
fat duck yonder speaks evil of every one, and that's against our
principles: if we have nothing good to tell, we should hold our beaks.
The Portuguese is the only one who has any education, and with whom
one can associate, but she is passionate, and talks too much about
Portugal."

"I wonder what those two Chinese are always whispering to one another
about," whispered one duck to her friend. "They annoy me--we have
never spoken to them."

Now the drake came up. He thought the little singing bird was a
sparrow.

"Well, I don't understand the difference," he said; "and indeed it's
all the same thing. He's only a plaything, and if one has them, why,
one has them."

"Don't attach any value to what he says," the Portuguese whispered.
"He's very respectable in business matters; and with him business
takes precedence of everything. But now I shall lie down for a rest.
One owes that to oneself, that one may be nice and fat when one is to
be embalmed with apples and plums."

And accordingly she lay down in the sun, and winked with one eye; and
she lay very comfortably, and she felt very comfortable, and she slept
very comfortably.

The little singing bird busied himself with his broken wing. At last
he lay down too, and pressed close to his protectress: the sun shone
warm and bright, and he had found a very good place.

But the neighbour's fowls were awake. They went about scratching up
the earth; and, to tell the truth, they had paid the visit simply and
solely to find food for themselves. The Chinese were the first to
leave the duck-yard; and the other fowls soon followed them. The witt