The chick with the worm had taken to his heels, unable to swallow his prize because of the hunt against him. Up and down the little world of their yard, he had run frantically, wildly, and silently (because of his mouth being full). And up and down, wildly, frantically and vociferously (their mouths being empty) his fellow-chicks had pursued him, bent on catching him and taking away from him whatever it was he prized enough to try to possess. As he turned and doubled to escape them, they turned and doubled in a pack, slipping, falling, and trampling on each other in their blind fury. Presently, “What do you _think_!” cried the oldest of the Thors. “He got so rattled that he lost his piece of worm out of his mouth, but the others didn’t give him time to tell them that. Anyhow, they’d yelled and carried on so, they had him up in the air. He didn’t know by that time what he _was_ doing; and he kept on legging it as hard as ever, and they after him.” By and by, this insane flight and agitation had so exhausted them all that they were staggering feebly on their tiny legs, and unable to emit more than hoarse squawks as they ran. Then, apparently by chance, as he darted zigzag to and fro, he had run under a corner of the brooder. Instantly ... ah-h-h, the grateful warmth and darkness had suggested rest to his weary soul; with a long murmured “che-e-eep” of utter relief, he had settled down against the wall of the brooder to close his eyes. And each of his pursuers, as they dashed in after him, had seized on the Heaven-sent opportunity for rest after the terrible tension of the struggle for existence, imposed on them by a cruel fate, and had with a sigh and a relieved, whispered twitter, given himself over to sleep and dreams. At the time when I came up, every chick was sound asleep in the brooder, while outside in the middle of their world, lay the untouched pile of angleworms, bare and open to view under the bright spring sky. “Can you beat it!” said Mars contemptuously. He turned away from such unimaginable imbecility to a new idea, “Say, kids!” he bellowed, although they were all within touching distance of him, “let's be cops and robbers!” They flared up like tinder to a spark, “All right! I’ll be Chief of Police!” “I’ll be a detective!” “I’ll be the robber captain ... cave’s under the hay, as usual.” “No, _I_ wanted to be robber captain!” “No, me, me!” They all wanted to be robber captain, it seemed. They streamed away to the barn, wrangling over this. All but one. The youngest Thor, newer than the others to the god-business, still hung over the wire-netting, grieving, “Seems ’s if ... if we could only _tell_ them! They _love_ angleworms so!” he said pityingly. “If I could only think of some way to _teach_ them how to stand around quietly, and each one get all he wanted to. They’d have such a _good_ time!” he yearned over them. As I said nothing, he asked of the world in general, “Why won’t they? Oh, why _won’t_ they?”