Reminding The Hen

“It’s well I ran into the garden,”
Said Eddie, his face all aglow;
“For what do you think, mamma, happened?
You never will guess it, I know.
The little brown hen was there clucking;
‘Cut-cut!’ she’d say, quick as a wink,
Then ‘Cut-cut’ again, only slower;
And then she would stop short and think.
“And then she would say it all over—
She did look so mad and so vext;
For, mamma, do you know, she’d forgotten
The word she ought to cluck next.
So I said ‘Ca-daw-cut,’ ‘Ca-daw-cut,’
As loud and as strong as I could.
And she looked ’round at me very thankful
I tell you, it made her feel good.
“Then she flapped, and said, ‘Cut-cut—ca-daw-cut!’
She remembered just how it went, then,
But it’s well I ran into the garden,—
She might never have clucked right again!”