Beechnut looked round at all that the boys had been doing, with great interest. He examined the ladder particularly, and said that it was made in a very workmanlike manner. Phonny showed Beechnut his cage too, though he said that he had pretty much concluded not to finish it that afternoon. "I don't see why you need finish it at all," said Beechnut. "You have got a very good cage already for your squirrel." "What cage?" asked Phonny. "This shop. It is a great deal better cage for him than that box,--_I_ think, and I have no doubt that he thinks so too." "He would gnaw out of this shop," said Phonny. "Not any more easily than he would gnaw out of the box," said Beechnut. Phonny turned to his box and looked at the smooth surface of the pine which formed the interior. He perceived that Frink could gnaw through anywhere, easily, in an hour. "I did not think of that," said Phonny "I must line it with tin." He began to picture to his mind, the process of putting his arm into the box and nailing tin there, where there was no room to work a hammer, and sighed. "Well," said he, "I'll let him have the whole shop, to-night, and now we will go out and try the ladder." The whole party accordingly went to the hen-house. Beechnut examined the small door that Stuyvesant had made, and the button of the large door, while Stuyvesant was planting the ladder. Phonny was eager to go up first; Stuyvesant followed him. Phonny mounted upon the floor of the loft, and immediately afterward began to exclaim, "Oo--oo--Stivy,--here is old Gipsy, on a nest, and I verily believe that she is setting; I could not think what had become of old Gipsy." Just at this time, Beechnut's head appeared coming up the ladder. He called upon the boys to come back, away from the hen, while he went up to see. She was upon a nest there, squatted down very low, and with her wings spread wide as if trying to cover a great nest full of eggs. "Yes," said Beechnut, "she is setting, I have no doubt; and as she has been missing a long time, I presume the chickens are about coming out." "Hark!" said Beechnut. The boys listened, and they heard a faint peeping sound under the hen. Beechnut looked toward the boys and smiled. Phonny was in an ecstacy of delight. Stuyvesant was much more quiet, but he seemed equally pleased. Beechnut said that he thought that they had better go away and leave the hen to herself, and that probably she would come off the nest, with her brood, that evening or the next morning. "But stop," said Beechnut, as he was going down the ladder. "It is important to ascertain whether they are eggs or chickens under the hen. For if they are eggs they are one third your property, and if they are chickens, they are all mine."