Then their food was prepared, the yolks of hard-boiled eggs crumbled up fine, bread crumbs, milk, and a little fine cracked corn. After a few days they could be fed almost entirely upon the cracked corn. The whole family then stood around the yard admiring the brood, thirty little, bright-eyed, yellow, fluffy balls. They soon learned to eat and to drink, and were busy, happy little creatures. They would run under the hover when they wanted warmth or quiet, just as naturally as they would have run under a mother hen. The box was built on castors, and could be rolled from window to window, and thus kept in the sunlight, in which the little creatures reveled; and at night it could be pushed near the stove. Of course August had to renew the gravel very often, and he was very particular to keep the food dishes sweet and clean. When the weather grew warm enough the yard was rolled into an open shed, and they could run out of doors. These chickens were considered very wonderful, and many visitors came to see them. They grew fast and were as tame as kittens. Day after day the children came to feed the pretty pets, bringing them young clover tops and tender grass. Katie treated them with her birds' canary and hemp seed. Robbie gave them bits of his cookies and cakes. Anything that the children liked to eat, these little chickens liked also; and when they heard the little boots coming towards them they would perch on the edge of their yard and chirp and peep and coax for their dainties. By and by their wings began to grow and the fluffy down was changed to feathers. Grandma said that now they must have meat occasionally, chopped up fine, and they had it Wednesdays and Saturdays. The little creatures were frantic for the meat. They would fly upon August, and, if they could get there, into the dish, which they more than once overturned. When their plumage was well out they were handsome fowls. August built a large coop and out-door yard for them, but they were not often confined in it, for the children loved to have them about with them, and watched them as carefully as a hen mother could have done; and great was the joy of Katie and Robbie as they ran to their mother to report the first crowing of the little cockerels. When last I saw them they were well grown. The pullets, August proudly informed me, were laying. It was the glorious Fourth. Torpedoes were the order of the day, and Katie and Robbie were amusing themselves by throwing the snappers in all directions, and seeing their feathered pets run to eat what they could never find. The other fowls, disturbed by the noise of the day, preferred to keep hidden away in their houses, but these liked to keep about with the children and see the fun.