The wagging jaws of the old paupers stopped as if petrified.  Keeper Wixon peered under his hand and retreated a few paces.  Even doughty Cap’n Sproul, accustomed to the marvels of land and sea, snapped his eyes.  As for Reeves, he gasped “Great gorlemity!” under his breath, and sat down on the edge of his crate, as though his legs had given out.

The creature that rose solemnly up from the billowing folds of the bagging had a head as smooth and round as a door-knob, dangling, purple wattles under its bill, and breast of a sanguinary red, picked clean of feathers.  There were not many feathers on the fowl, anyway.  Its tail was merely a spreading of quills like spikes.  It was propped on legs like stilts, and when it stretched to crow it stood up as tall as a yard-stick.

“Let out your old doostrabulus, there!” Hiram commanded.

“That ain’t no hen,” wailed his adversary.

“It’s got two legs, a bill, and a place for tail-feathers, and that’s near enough to a hen for fightin’ purposes in this town—­accordin’ to what I’ve seen of the sport here,” insisted the showman.  “The principal hen-fightin’ science in Smyrna seems to be to stand on t’ other hen and peck him to pieces!  Well, Reeves, Cap’n Kidd there ain’t got so much pedigree as some I’ve owned, but as a stander and pecker I’m thinkin’ he’ll give a good, fair account of himself.”

“It’s a gum-game,” protested Reeves, agitatedly, “and I ain’t goin’ to fight no ostrich nor hen-hawk.”

“Then I’ll take the stakes without further wear or tear,” said Hiram.  “Am I right, boys?” A unanimous chorus indorsed him.  “And this here is something that I reckon ye won’t go to law about,” the showman went on, ominously, “even if you have got a lawyer in the family.  You ketch, don’t you?”

The unhappy second selectman realized his situation, sighed, and pried a slat off the crate.  His nomination was more sanguine than he.  The rooster hopped upon the crate, crowed, and stalked out onto the barn floor with a confidence that made Reeves perk up courage a bit.

Cap’n Kidd showed abstraction rather than zeal.  He was busily engaged in squinting along his warty legs, and at last detected two or three objects that were annoying him.  He picked them off leisurely.  Then he ran his stiff and scratchy wing down his leg, yawned, and seemed bored.

When the other rooster ran across and pecked him viciously on his red expanse of breast, he cocked his head sideways and looked down wonderingly on this rude assailant.  Blood trickled from the wound, and Reeves giggled nervously.  Cap’n Sproul muttered something and looked apprehensive, but Hiram, his eyes hard and his lips set, crouched at the side of the floor, and seemed to be waiting confidently.

Widow Pike’s favorite stepped back, rapped his bill on the floor several times, and then ran at his foe once more.  A second trail of blood followed his blow.  This time the unknown ducked his knobby head at the attacker.  It looked like a blow with a slung-shot.  But it missed, and Reeves tittered again.