Master Gray Cock came home in high spirits and complimented her; told her she was looking charmingly once more, and said, "Very well, very nice!" as he surveyed the young brood. So that Mrs. Feathertop began to feel the world going well with her, when suddenly in came Dame Scratchard and Goody Kertarkut to make a morning call. "Let's see the chicks," said Dame Scratchard. "Goodness me," said Goody Kertarkut, "what a likeness to their dear papa!" "Well, but bless me, what's the matter with their bills?" said Dame Scratchard. "Why, my dear, these chicks are deformed! I'm sorry for you, my dear, but it's all the result of your inexperience; you ought to have eaten pebble-stones with your meal when you were setting. Don't you see, Dame Kertarkut, what bills they have? That'll increase, and they'll be frightful!" "What shall I do?" said Mrs. Feathertop, now greatly alarmed. "Nothing as I know of," said Dame Scratchard, "since you didn't come to me before you set. I could have told you all about it. Maybe it won't kill 'em, but they'll always be deformed." And so the gossips departed, leaving a sting under the pin-feathers of the poor little hen mamma, who began to see that her darlings had curious little spoon-bills different from her own, and to worry and fret about it. "My dear," she said to her spouse, "do get Doctor Peppercorn to come in and look at their bills, and see if anything can be done." Doctor Peppercorn came in, and put on a monstrous pair of spectacles and said: "Hum! Ha! Extraordinary case--very singular!" "Did you ever see anything like it, Doctor?" said both parents, in a breath. "I've read of such cases. It's a calcareous enlargement of the vascular bony tissue, threatening ossification," said the Doctor. "Oh, dreadful!--can it be possible?" shrieked both parents. "Can anything be done?" "Well, I should recommend a daily lotion made of mosquitoes' horns and bicarbonate of frogs' toes together with a powder, to be taken morning and night, of muriate of fleas. One thing you must be careful about: they must never wet their feet, nor drink any water." "Dear me, Doctor, I don't know what I _shall_ do, for they seem to have a particular fancy for getting into water." "Yes, a morbid tendency often found in these cases of bony tumification of the vascular tissue of the mouth; but you must resist it, ma'am, as their life depends upon it." And with that Doctor Peppercorn glared gloomily on the young ducks, who were stealthily poking the objectionable little spoon-bills out from under their mothers' feathers.