The Donkey Who Sinned

    The Donkey Who Sinned
Once a Lion and a Leopard¹ and a Dog and a Donkey were sitting in a field. The sun was hot; there was no rain; there was no water in the river; the fields were dusty, and there was no food.
    The Lion said, "Why is everything so bad? Why is there no rain? Why is there no food? There is no food because one of us has sinned, and God is angry with us."The Leopard said, "Yes, one of us has sinned."The Dog said, "One of us has sinned."Then the Donkey said, "We will each tell our sins. Then God will not be angry and will send rain."So the Lion began, "I have sinned a great sin. I found a poor man's cow near a village. I killed it and ate it."The others were afraid of the Lion, so they said, "No! No! That was not a sin."Then the Leopard said, "I have sinned a great sin. I found an old woman with goat on the hill. I jumped out, and the old woman ran away, and I killed the old woman's goat."The others said, " A little girl had a cat. She loved it very much. I quarrelled with the cat and killed it."The others said, "Oh, no, that was not a sin."Then the three other beasts looked at the Donkey.
    The Donkey said, "The man was going with me to the village. He stood and spoke² to a friend. Then I ate a little grass from the side of the road."The other beasts said, "Oh! Oh! Oh! That was a sin. That was a great sin. Now we know why God is angry with us and there is no rain." Then they all jumped at him and killed him.

1 leopard   

n.豹

参考例句：

• I saw a man in a leopard skin yesterday.我昨天看见一个穿着豹皮的男人。
• The leopard's skin is marked with black spots.豹皮上有黑色斑点。

2 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。