It was just as well for August to be occupied, since the hatching, although it went on surely, was slow work. With great faith in his incubator, August had previously built a little yard for the expected chickens. It was in box form, about eight feet long and two feet wide. In the center was a feeding-tray and water tank, and at one end a hover. This hover (H) was [Illustration: THE ARTIFICIAL MOTHER.] lined with soft fur loosely tacked to the top and sides and hanging down the front in narrow strips to form a curtain. It sloped from the front to the back. The water tank was a stout earthen bottle in a saucer; a small hole near the bottom of the bottle let the water, drop by drop, into the saucer, so that as the chickens drank, the supply in the saucer was continually freshening. The bottom of the yard was covered with gravel three inches deep. This neat yard was now waiting down stairs in a sunny shed room to receive the chickens. August went to school, and on his way home called for his grandmother to go up to the house to dinner. Grandma knew that it was just three weeks since August had taken the last eggs, and that twenty-one days was the time allotted by nature for the bringing forth of chickens, so she shrewdly suspected what she would find; but it had not occurred to her that she would find chickens alive without the aid of a hen. "Grandma," asked August, as they walked along "when you set a hen on thirteen eggs, how many do you expect will hatch?" "I hope for all," she replied, "but I seldom get all. I think ten out of thirteen is a very good proportion." "My incubator beats your hens!" thought August. When they reached the house he took her straight to the attic. "Well, I never!" she exclaimed. "So that is your secret, August! Well, I declare! And it really hatches the eggs, doesn't it? I always knew, child, that you would invent something wonderful." "I didn't _invent_ much," he said modestly. "In 1750, Reaumur, the French naturalist, gave an account of his experiments in hatching eggs in barrels set in hot-beds of horse-manure; and the Chinese and the Egyptians have hatched them for ages in ovens." "But this is by hot water and lamps," said Grandma. "Yes," said August, "I never saw an incubator before I made this; but, Grandma, I had read of them made on the same principle." "At any rate," said Grandma, "I think that you deserve great credit for patience and ingenuity." By evening thirty chickens were hatched from the thirty-six eggs. The other six gave no signs of life. By Grandma's advice they were left in the incubator "to give them a chance," but they never hatched. The next morning all the members of the family took the chickens down-stairs, even Robbie, who took two in a basket, and deposited them in their new home.