That is the extent of his society. "It is too bad," I said one day, and scoured the country for a canary-bird. Everybody had had one, but it was sold. Then I remembered Barnum's Happy Family, and went out to the hen-pen, and brought in a little auburn chicken, with white breast, and wings just budding; a size and a half larger than Cheri, it is true, but the smallest of the lot, and very soft and small for a chicken, the prettiest wee, waddling tot you ever saw, a Minnie Warren of a little duck, and put him in the cage. A tempest in a teapot! Cheri went immediately into fits and furies. He hopped about convulsively. You might have supposed him attacked simultaneously with St. Anthony's fire, St. Vitus's dance, and delirium tremens. He shrieked, he writhed, he yelled, he raved. The chicken was stupid. If he had exerted himself a little to be agreeable, if he had only shown the smallest symptom of interest or curiosity or desire to cultivate an acquaintance, I have no doubt something might have been accomplished; but he just huddled down in one corner of the cage, half frightened to death, like a logy, lumpy, country bumpkin as he was, and I swept him back to his native coop in disgust. Relieved from the lout's presence, Cheri gradually laid aside his tantrums, smoothed down his ruffled plumes, and resumed the manners of a gentleman. My attempt at happy families was nipped in the bud, decidedly. By and by I went to the market-town, and, having sold my butter and eggs, hunted up a bird-fancier. He had plenty of heliotropes, verbenas, and japonicas, and HAD had plenty of birds, but of course they were every one gone. Nobody wanted them. He had just about given them away, for a quarter of a dollar or so, and since then ever so many had been to buy them. Could he tell me where I might find one? Yes, he sold one to the barber last week, down near the depot. Didn't believe but what he would sell it. Was it a female bird? For my ambition had grown by what it fed on, and, instead of contenting myself simply with a companion for Cheri, I was now planning for a whole brood of canaries, with all the interests of housekeeping, baby-tending, and the manifold small cares incident upon domestic life. In short, I was launching out upon an entirely new career, setting a new world a-spinning in that small wire cage. Yes, it was a female bird. A good bird? For I could not understand the marvelously low price. Yes 'm, prime. Had eight young ones last year. Eight young ones! I rather caught my breath. I wanted a brood, but I thought three was the regular number, and I must confess I could hardly look with fortitude on such a sudden and enormous accession of responsibility. Besides, the cage was not half large enough. And how could they all bathe? And how could I take proper care of so many? And, dear me, eight young ones! And eight more next year is sixteen. And the grandchildren! And