"What a funny chicken!" said Sarah aloud, turning her attention from the grunting pigs before her to a solitary chicken behind her, a feat which nearly cost her her balance. "I do b'lieve it's sick!" she declared, jumping down and walking over to the limp-looking fowl which stared at her coldly from a glassy eye. Sarah, in the few weeks she had spent on the farm, had really learned a good deal about the care of the stock. To her natural love for animals and aptitude for handling them, she had added a store of knowledge gleaned by asking questions of the boys and Mr. Hildreth and observing them as they went about the barns. She had faithfully tagged Mrs. Hildreth, who took care of the poultry too, and had often seen her pick up a chicken and examine it. So now she picked up the apathetic bird and felt of his crop with exploring little brown fingers. "You're hungry, I'll bet," she informed him. "You probably didn't feel well this morning and the other hens knocked you away from the corn. Don't you care, I'll get you some breakfast, all for yourself." Sarah knew where the grain bins were in the barn and she went in and opened them all. Using her dress as an apron she selected a handful of wheat, another of cracked corn, some buckwheat, a generous scoop of "middlings" and a double handful of the meat scraps bought especially for the ducks. Then out she dashed and spread the feast before the hen who really did brighten up and eat a good deal of the grain. No one hen could have eaten it all--and survived--and of course the other chickens spied the feast in time, but not before the invalid had been revived somewhat. "Now I'll put you in a coop till you feel better," said Sarah, "so nothing can pick on you." She stuffed her patient into one of the feeding coops in the poultry yard, gave her a pan of water and then, feeling more cheerful herself, decided to go wading. She glanced toward the house, reflected that if she went back to get Shirley her mother might object to the wading plan or, worse yet, Winnie set her at some useful task, and made up her mind to amuse herself alone. "Going wading?" called Warren cheerfully, as she skirted the cornfield where he sat on the swaying cultivator pulled by the plodding Solomon, both horse and boy protected from the blazing sun by straw hats. Sarah refused to reply. She had no intention of resuming friendly intercourse so soon after the painful episode of the morning. "He needn't think he can boss me," she scolded, sitting down by the brook to take off her shoes and stockings. "Ow, the water's cold!" Like a great many older people, Sarah preferred to think a long time before she committed herself to an icy flood. She tucked her feet under her comfortably and gave herself up to thought. In the grass beside her a hundred busy little ants ran to and fro and Sarah's speculations led her to wonder whether they had ever made a trip by water.