sounded Silas Trent, the mail-carrier, about this and Mr. Trent had an
offer to make.

"I tell ye what it is," said the garrulous Silas, "the chicken business is
a good business--if ye kin 'tend to it right. I tried it--went in deep
for incubator, brooders, and the like; and it would have been all right
if I didn't hafter be away from home so much durin' the day.

"My wife's got rheumatiz, and she can't git out to 'tend to little chicks,
and for a few weeks they need a sight of attention--that's right. They'd
oughter be fed every two hours, or so, and watched pretty close.

"So I had ter give it up last year, an' this year I ain't put an egg in
my incubator.

"But if I could git 'em growed to scratchin' state--say, when they're
broiler-size--I sartainly would like it. Tell ye what I'll do, Miss. I'll
let ye have my incubator. It's 200-egg size. In course, ye don't hafter
fill it first time if ye don't wanter. Put in a hundred eggs and see how
ye come out."

"But how could I pay you?" asked Lyddy.

"I'll sell ye the incubator outright, if ye want to buy. And I'll take my
pay in chickens when they're broiler-size--say three months old."

"What do you want for your incubator?" queried Lyddy, thoughtfully.

"Ten dollars. It's a good one. And I'll take a flock of twenty
three-months-old chicks in pay for it--fifteen pullets and five cockerels.
What kind of hens do you favor, Miss Bray?"

Lyddy told him the breed she had thought of purchasing--and the strain.

"Them's fine birds," declared Mr. Trent. "For heavy fowl they are good
layers--and when ye butcher one of 'em for the table, ye got suthin' to
eat. Now, you think my offer over. I'll stick to it. And I'll set the
incubator up and show ye how to run it."

Lyddy was very anxious to venture into the chicken business--and here was
a chance to do it cheaply. It was the five dollars for a hundred hatching
eggs that made her hesitate.

But Aunt Jane had shown herself to be more than a little interested in
the girls' venture at Hillcrest Farm, and when she expressed the keys
of the garret chests and bureaus to Lyddy--so that the girl could get
at the stores of linen left from the old doctor's day--she sent, too,
twenty-five dollars.

"Keep it against emergencies. Pay it back when you can. And don't let's
have no talk about it," was the old lady's characteristic note.

Lyddy was only doubtful as to whether this desire of hers to raise
chickens was really "an em