next hers gave her a bold look and
asked, "What are you here for?"

"I've come to get the first prize," Henrietta answered calmly. She had
listened carefully to what Farmer Green and Johnnie had said to each
other during the journey from the farm. And already she knew something
about fairs.

Her new neighbor laughed right in Henrietta's face.

"I don't see how you can win the first prize," she said with a sniff.
"I'm going to get the first prize myself. There never was another such
fine family as mine." She glanced proudly at her chicks as she spoke.
"The best you can hope for," she told Henrietta, "is the second prize.
And you'll be lucky if you get the third."

For once Henrietta Hen was at a loss for a retort.

"I don't believe you've ever been at a fair before," her new neighbor
observed.

Henrietta admitted faintly that she hadn't.

"Last year I won second prize," said the other. "I'd have had the first
if the judges had known their business."

Henrietta Hen began to feel very shaky in her legs. She had expected a
different sort of greeting, when she should arrive at the fair. She had
thought everybody would exclaim, "Here comes Henrietta Hen! What a fine
family of chicks she has! And aren't Mrs. Hen's speckles beautiful?"

And there she was, with nobody paying any heed to her, except the lofty
dame in the next pen, who had said nothing very agreeable.

"Oh, dear!" Henrietta sighed. "I wish I'd never left home."

"What's that?" her neighbor inquired in a sharp tone. "You aren't
homesick, are you?"

"N-no!" said Henrietta. "But I had expected to win the first prize. And I
don't know what my friends will say when I come back home without it."

"Well, everybody can't win it," said her new acquaintance. "Not the same
year, anyhow!" And then she looked Henrietta up and down for a few
moments, while Henrietta squirmed uneasily. "Where do you come from?" she
asked at last.

"I live on Farmer Green's place, in Pleasant Valley," Henrietta informed
her.

The lady in the next pen shook her head. "I've never heard of Pleasant
Valley," she remarked, "nor of Farmer Green. He must be small potatoes."

Well, Henrietta was astonished. She began to feel as if she were nobody
at all. She had supposed that everybody knew of Pleasant Valley--and of
Farmer Green, too. As for the remark, "small potatoes," she didn't
understand it at all. So she inquired what it meant.

"It means," said her neighbor, "that Farmer Gre