... engineer by profession, I conceived a mechanical means of giving those hens the scare of their lives if they persisted in their antisocial habits. I constructed a "spoof" egg of white enamelled metal, with hinges that opened when a catch was touched. Inside I compressed one of those jack-in-the-box snakes that spring out ... — Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, May 21, 1919. • Various
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