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_It's Perfectly Certain_ was written by Hans Christian
Andersen (1805-1875), and was translated from the Danish
by M. R. James (1862-1936) as part of his _Hans Andersen
Forty-Two Stories_ (1930).

Title: Hans Andersen Forty-Two Stories -- It's Perfectly Certain
Author: Andersen, Hans Christian (1805-1875)
Translator: James, Montague Rhodes (1862-1936)
Date of first publication: 1930
Place and date of edition used as base for this ebook:
   London: Faber and Faber, 1953
Date first posted: 30 November 2009
Date last updated: 30 November 2009
Project Gutenberg Canada ebook #424

This ebook was produced by:
David T. Jones, Mark Akrigg
& the Online Distributed Proofreading Team
at http://www.pgdpcanada.net




It's Perfectly Certain

by

Hans Christian Andersen

(from _Hans Andersen Forty-Two Stories_ [1930],
translated by M. R. James)


"That's a terrible story," said a hen--it was in a part of the town
where the affair had not taken place--"that's a terrible story about
the hen-house! I shouldn't dare to sleep alone at night! It's a good
thing there are so many of us on the perch." She proceeded to tell it,
so that the feathers of the other hens stood on end, and the cock let
his comb droop. "It's perfectly certain!"

But we will begin at the beginning, and this took place in a hen-house
in another quarter of the town. The sun had set, and the hens had
flown up to roost. One of them--she had white feathers and short
legs--laid her regulation egg, and was a respectable hen in every way.
Just as she got on the perch, she pecked at herself with her beak, and
a little feather fell off her.

"There it goes," said she; "the more I peck myself the prettier I
get!" It was said, to be sure, in fun, for she was the merry one among
the hens, being for the rest, as I said, highly respectable, and
thereupon she went to sleep.

It was dark all round; hen sat by hen, and the one that sat next to
her did not go to sleep. She heard and she didn't hear, as indeed one
must in this world if one is to live in peace and quiet, but she
couldn't help saying to her neighbour: "Did you hear what was said
just then? I name no names, but there is a hen who plucks herself to
improve her looks. If I were a cock I should despise her."

Now just above the hens sat Mrs. Owl with her owl husband and owl
children. They had sharp ears in that family; they heard every word
the neighbour hen said, and they rolled their eyes, and the mother owl
fanned herself with her wings. "Pray don't listen--but you must have
heard what was said just then. I heard it with my own ears, and one's
bound to hear a lot before they fall off! There's one of the hens who
has so totally forgotten what is becoming for a hen that she sits
there pecking off all her feathers and allowing the cock to look on."

"_Prenez garde aux enfants_," said the father owl. "That's not a thing
for the children to hear."

"But I must tell just the owl over the way; she is such a very well
conducted bird." And off flew the mother.

"Hoo hoo! Oo hoo!" they both hooted down to the pigeons in the
pigeon-house, over the way: "Have you heard? Have you heard? There's a
hen who has plucked off all her feathers for love of the cock! She'll
freeze to death, if she's not dead already. Oo hoo!"

"Where, where?" cooed the pigeons.

"In the yard over the way. I as good as saw it myself. It's almost too
improper a story to tell; but it's perfectly certain."

"I'm sure, I'm sure of it; every single word," said the pigeons, and
cooed down to their own hen-house: "There's a hen--some say there are
two--who have plucked off all their feathers so as not to look like
the rest, and attract the cock's notice that way. It's a risky game!
One can easily catch a chill and die of fever, and they _are_ dead,
both of them."

"Wake up! Wake up!" crowed the cock, flying up on to the board fence.
He was still a bit drowsy, but he crowed for all that. "There are
three hens who have died of unrequited affection for a cock; they've
plucked all their feathers off. It's an ugly story. I won't keep it to
myself. Pass it on!" "Pass it on!" squeaked the bats. And the hens
clucked and the cocks crowed: "Pass it on! Pass it on!" And so the
story went from one hen-house to another, and finally back to the
place from which it had really started.

"There are five hens", it ran "who have all plucked their feathers off
to show which of them has got thinnest from affection for the cock!
And after that they pecked each one another till the blood came and
all fell down dead, to the shame and scandal of their family and the
grave damage of their owners." And the hen who had dropped the little
loose feather naturally did not recognize her own story, and as she
was a respectable hen, she said: "I despise those hens. But, alas,
there are many of that class! A thing like this ought not to be hushed
up, and I shall do what I can to let this story get into the papers,
and be known through the whole country. That is what these hens and
their families deserve!"

It did get into the papers, and was printed, and it is perfectly
certain: one little feather can turn into five hens.




[End of _It's Perfectly Certain_ by Hans Christian Andersen, from
_Hans Andersen Forty-Two Stories_, translated by M. R. James]
