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(单词翻译:双击或拖选)
1
The Three Farmers
Down in the valley there were three farms. The owners of these farms had done well. They were rich men. They were also nasty men. All three of them were about as nasty and mean as any men you could meet. Their names were Farmer Boggis, Farmer Bunce and Farmer Bean.
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Boggis was a chicken farmer. He kept thousands of chickens. He was enormously fat. This was because he ate three boiled chickens smothered1 with dumplings every day for breakfast, lunch and supper.
Bunce was a duck-and-goose farmer. He kept thousands of ducks and geese. He was a kind of pot-bellied dwarf2. He was so short his chin would have been underwater in the shallow end of any swimming-pool in the world. His food was doughnuts and goose-livers. He mashed3 the livers into a disgusting paste and then stuffed the paste into the doughnuts. This diet gave him a tummy-ache and a beastly temper.
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Bean was a turkey-and-apple farmer. He kept thousands of turkeys in an orchard4 full of apple trees. He never ate any food at all. Instead, he drank gallons of strong cider which he made from the apples in his orchard. He was as thin as a pencil and the cleverest of them all.
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‘Boggis and Bunce and Bean
One fat, one short, one lean.
So different in looks
Were none the less equally mean.’
That is what the children round about used to sing when they saw them.
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2
Mr Fox
On a hill above the valley there was a wood.
In the wood there was a huge tree.
Under the tree there was a hole.
In the hole lived Mr Fox and Mrs Fox and their four Small Foxes.
Every evening as soon as it got dark, Mr Fox would say to Mrs Fox, ‘Well, my darling, what shall it be this time? A plump chicken from Boggis? A duck or a goose from Bunce? Or a nice turkey from Bean?’ And when Mrs Fox had told him what she wanted, Mr Fox would creep down into the valley in the darkness of the night and help himself.
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Boggis and Bunce and Bean knew very well what was going on, and it made them wild with rage. They were not men who liked to give anything away. Less still did they like anything to be stolen from them. So every night each of them would take his shotgun and hide in a dark place somewhere on his own farm, hoping to catch the robber.
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But Mr Fox was too clever for them. He always approached a farm with the wind blowing in his face, and this meant that if any man were lurking6 in the shadows ahead, the wind would carry the smell of that man to Mr Fox’s nose from far away. Thus, if Mr Boggis was hiding behind his Chicken House Number One, Mr Fox would smell him out from fifty yards off and quickly change direction, heading for Chicken House Number Four at the other end of the farm.
‘Dang and blast that lousy beast!’ cried Boggis.
‘He must be killed!’ cried Bean.
‘But how?’ said Boggis. ‘How on earth can we catch the blighter?’
Bean picked his nose delicately with a long finger. ‘I have a plan,’ he said.
‘You’ve never had a decent plan yet,’ said Bunce.
‘Shut up and listen,’ said Bean. ‘Tomorrow night we will all hide just outside the hole where the fox lives. We will wait there until he comes out. Then… Bang! Bang-bang-bang.’
‘Very clever,’ said Bunce. ‘But first we shall have to find the hole.’
‘My dear Bunce, I’ve already found it,’ said the crafty8 Bean. ‘It’s up in the wood on the hill. It’s under a huge tree…’
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3
The Shooting
‘Well, my darling,’ said Mr Fox. ‘What shall it be tonight?’
‘I think we’ll have duck tonight,’ said Mrs Fox. ‘Bring us two fat ducks, if you please. One for you and me, and one for the children.’
‘Ducks it shall be!’ said Mr Fox. ‘Bunce’s best!’
‘Now do be careful,’ said Mrs Fox.
‘My darling,’ said Mr Fox, ‘I can smell those goons a mile away. I can even smell one from the other. Boggis gives off a filthy9 stink10 of rotten chicken-skins. Bunce reeks11 of goose-livers, and as for Bean, the fumes12 of apple cider hang around him like poisonous gases.’
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‘Yes, but just don’t get careless,’ said Mrs Fox. ‘You know they’ll be waiting for you, all three of them.’
‘Don’t you worry about me,’ said Mr Fox. ‘I’ll see you later.’
But Mr Fox would not have been quite so cocky had he known exactly where the three farmers were waiting at that moment. They were just outside the entrance to the hole, each one crouching13 behind a tree with his gun loaded. And what is more, they had chosen their positions very carefully, making sure that the wind was not blowing from them towards the fox’s hole. In fact, it was blowing in the opposite direction. There was no chance of them being ‘smelled out’.
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Mr Fox crept up the dark tunnel to the mouth of his hole. He poked14 his long handsome face out into the night air and sniffed15 once.
He moved an inch or two forward and stopped.
He sniffed again. He was always especially careful when coming out from his hole.
He inched forward a little more. The front half of his body was now in the open.
His black nose twitched16 from side to side, sniffing18 and sniffing for the scent19 of danger. He found none, and he was just about to go trotting20 forward into the wood when he heard or thought he heard a tiny noise, a soft rustling21 sound, as though someone had moved a foot ever so gently through a patch of dry leaves.
Mr Fox flattened22 his body against the ground and lay very still, his ears pricked23. He waited a long time, but he heard nothing more.
‘It must have been a field-mouse,’ he told himself, ‘or some other small animal.’
He crept a little further out of the hole… then further still. He was almost right out in the open now. He took a last careful look around. The wood was murky24 and very still. Somewhere in the sky the moon was shining.
Just then, his sharp night-eyes caught a glint of something bright behind a tree not far away. It was a small silver speck25 of moonlight shining on a polished surface. Mr Fox lay still, watching it. What on earth was it? Now it was moving. It was coming up and up… Great heavens! It was the barrel of a gun! Quick as a whip, Mr Fox jumped back into his hole and at that same instant the entire wood seemed to explode around him. Bang-bang! Bang-bang! Bang-bang!
The smoke from the three guns floated upward in the night air. Boggis and Bunce and Bean came out from behind their trees and walked towards the hole.
‘Did we get him?’ said Bean.
One of them shone a flashlight on the hole, and there on the ground, in the circle of light, half in and half out of the hole, lay the poor tattered26 bloodstained remains27 of… a fox’s tail. Bean picked it up. ‘We got the tail but we missed the fox,’ he said, tossing the thing away.
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‘Dang and blast!’ said Boggis. ‘We shot too late. We should have let fly the moment he poked his head out.’
Bean pulled a flask29 from his pocket and took a swig of cider. Then he said, ‘It’ll take three days at least before he gets hungry enough to come out again. I’m not sitting around here waiting for that. Let’s dig him out.’
‘Ah,’ said Boggis. ‘Now you’re talking sense. We can dig him out in a couple of hours. We know he’s there.’
‘I reckon there’s a whole family of them down that hole,’ Bunce said.
4
The Terrible Shovels
Down the hole, Mrs Fox was tenderly licking the stump32 of Mr Fox’s tail to stop the bleeding. ‘It was the finest tail for miles around,’ she said between licks.
‘It hurts,’ said Mr Fox.
‘I know it does, sweetheart. But it’ll soon get better.’
‘And it will soon grow again, Dad,’ said one of the Small Foxes.
‘It will never grow again,’ said Mr Fox. ‘I shall be tail-less for the rest of my life.’ He looked very glum33.
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There was no food for the foxes that night, and soon the children dozed34 off. Then Mrs Fox dozed off. But Mr Fox couldn’t sleep because of the pain in the stump of his tail. ‘Well,’ he thought, ‘I suppose I’m lucky to be alive at all. And now they’ve found our hole, we’re going to have to move out as soon as possible. We’ll never get any peace if we… What was that?’ He turned his head sharply and listened. The noise he heard now was the most frightening noise a fox can ever hear – the scrape-scrape-scraping of shovels digging into the soil.
‘Wake up!’ he shouted. ‘They’re digging us out!’
Mrs Fox was wide awake in one second. She sat up, quivering all over. ‘Are you sure that’s it?’ she whispered.
‘I’m positive! Listen!’
‘They’ll kill my children!’ cried Mrs Fox.
‘Never!’ said Mr Fox.
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Scrunch36, scrunch, scrunch went the shovels above their heads. Small stones and bits of earth began falling from the roof of the tunnel.
‘How will they kill us, Mummy?’ asked one of the Small Foxes. His round black eyes were huge with fright. ‘Will there be dogs?’ he said.
Mrs Fox began to cry. She gathered her four children close to her and held them tight.
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Suddenly there was an especially loud crunch37 above their heads and the sharp end of a shovel30 came right through the ceiling. The sight of this awful thing seemed to have an electric effect upon Mr Fox. He jumped up and shouted, ‘I’ve got it! Come on! There’s not a moment to lose! Why didn’t I think of it before!’
‘Think of what, Dad?’
‘A fox can dig quicker than a man!’ shouted Mr Fox, beginning to dig. ‘Nobody in the world can dig as quick as a fox!’
The soil began to fly out furiously behind Mr Fox as he started to dig for dear life with his front feet. Mrs Fox ran forward to help him. So did the four children.
The tunnel began to grow longer and longer. It sloped steeply downward. Deeper and deeper below the surface of the ground it went. The mother and the father and all four of the children were digging together. Their front legs were moving so fast you couldn’t see them. And gradually the scrunching39 and scraping of the shovels became fainter and fainter.
After about an hour, Mr Fox stopped digging. ‘Hold it!’ he said. They all stopped. They turned and looked back up the long tunnel they had just dug. All was quiet. ‘Phew!’ said Mr Fox. ‘I think we’ve done it! They’ll never get as deep as this. Well done, everyone!’
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They all sat down, panting for breath. And Mrs Fox said to her children, ‘I should like you to know that if it wasn’t for your father we should all be dead by now. Your father is a fantastic fox.’
Mr Fox looked at his wife and she smiled. He loved her more than ever when she said things like that.
5
The Terrible Tractors
As the sun rose the next morning, Boggis and Bunce and Bean were still digging. They had dug a hole so deep you could have put a house into it. But they had not yet come to the end of the foxes’ tunnel. They were all very tired and cross.
‘Dang and blast!’ said Boggis. ‘Whose rotten idea was this?’
‘Bean’s idea,’ said Bunce.
Boggis and Bunce both stared at Bean. Bean took another swig of cider, then put the flask back into his pocket without offering it to the others. ‘Listen,’ he said angrily, ‘I want that fox! I’m going to get that fox! I’m not giving in till I’ve strung him up over my front porch, dead as a dumpling!’
‘We can’t get him by digging, that’s for sure,’ said the fat Boggis. ‘I’ve had enough of digging.’
Bunce, the little pot-bellied dwarf, looked up at Bean and said, ‘Have you got any more stupid ideas, then?’
‘What?’ said Bean. ‘I can’t hear you.’ Bean never took a bath. He never even washed. As a result, his earholes were clogged40 with all kinds of muck and wax and bits of chewing-gum and dead flies and stuff like that. This made him deaf. ‘Speak louder,’ he said to Bunce, and Bunce shouted back, ‘Got any more stupid ideas?’
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Bean rubbed the back of his neck with a dirty finger. He had a boil coming there and it itched17. ‘What we need on this job,’ he said, ‘is machines… mechanical shovels. We’ll have him out in five minutes with mechanical shovels.’
This was a pretty good idea and the other two had to admit it.
‘All right then,’ Bean said, taking charge. ‘Boggis, you stay here and see the fox doesn’t escape. Bunce and I will go and fetch our machinery41. If he tries to get out, shoot him quick.’
The long, thin Bean walked away. The tiny Bunce trotted42 after him. The fat Boggis stayed where he was with his gun pointing at the fox-hole.
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Soon, two enormous caterpillar43 tractors with mechanical shovels on their front ends came clanking into the wood. Bean was driving one, Bunce the other. The machines were both black. They were murderous, brutal-looking monsters.
‘Here we go, then!’ shouted Bean.
‘Death to the fox!’ shouted Bunce.
The machines went to work, biting huge mouthfuls of soil out of the hill. The big tree under which Mr Fox had dug his hole in the first place was toppled like a matchstick. On all sides, rocks were sent flying and trees were falling and the noise was deafening44.
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‘What’s happening, Dad?’ cried the Small Foxes. ‘What are they doing?’
Mr Fox didn’t know what was happening or what they were doing.
‘It’s an earthquake!’ cried Mrs Fox.
‘Look!’ said one of the Small Foxes. ‘Our tunnel’s got shorter! I can see daylight!’
They all looked round, and yes, the mouth of the tunnel was only a few feet away from them now, and in the circle of daylight beyond they could see the two huge black tractors almost on top of them.
‘Tractors!’ shouted Mr Fox. ‘And mechanical shovels! Dig for your lives! Dig, dig, dig!’
6
The Race
Now there began a desperate race, the machines against the foxes. In the beginning, the hill looked like this:
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After about an hour, as the machines bit away more and more soil from the hilltop, it looked like this:
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Sometimes the foxes would gain a little ground and the clanking noises would grow fainter and Mr Fox would say, ‘We’re going to make it! I’m sure we are!’ But then a few moments later, the machines would come back at them and the crunch of the mighty46 shovels would get louder and louder. Once the foxes actually saw the sharp metal edge of one of the shovels as it scraped up the earth just behind them.
‘Keep going, my darlings!’ panted Mr Fox. ‘Don’t give up!’
‘Keep going!’ the fat Boggis shouted to Bunce and Bean. ‘We’ll get him any moment now!’
‘Have you caught sight of him yet?’ Bean called back.
‘Not yet,’ shouted Boggis. ‘But I think you’re close!’
‘I’ll pick him up with my bucket!’ shouted Bunce. ‘I’ll chop him to pieces!’
But by lunchtime the machines were still at it. And so were the poor foxes. The hill now looked like this:
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The farmers didn’t stop for lunch; they were too keen to finish the job.
‘Hey there, Mr Fox!’ yelled Bunce, leaning out of his tractor. ‘We’re coming to get you now!’
‘You’ve had your last chicken!’ yelled Boggis. ‘You’ll never come prowling around my farm again!’
A sort of madness had taken hold of the three men. The tall skinny Bean and dwarfish47 pot-bellied Bunce were driving their machines like maniacs48, racing49 the motors and making the shovels dig at a terrific speed. The fat Boggis was hopping50 about like a dervish and shouting, ‘Faster! Faster!’
By five o’clock in the afternoon this is what had happened to the hill:
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The hole the machines had dug was like the crater51 of a volcano. It was such an extraordinary sight that crowds of people came rushing out from the surrounding villages to have a look. They stood on the edge of the crater and stared down at Boggis and Bunce and Bean.
‘Hey there, Boggis! What’s going on?’
‘We’re after a fox!’
‘You must be mad!’
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收听单词发音 |
1
smothered
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| （使）窒息， （使）透不过气( smother的过去式和过去分词 )； 覆盖； 忍住； 抑制 | |
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dwarf
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| n.矮子，侏儒，矮小的动植物；vt.使…矮小 | |
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mashed
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| a.捣烂的 | |
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4
orchard
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| n.果园，果园里的全部果树，(美俚)棒球场 | |
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crooks
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| n.骗子( crook的名词复数 )；罪犯；弯曲部分；（牧羊人或主教用的）弯拐杖v.弯成钩形( crook的第三人称单数 ) | |
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6
lurking
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| 潜在 | |
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7
guts
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| v.狼吞虎咽，贪婪地吃，飞碟游戏（比赛双方每组5人，相距15码，互相掷接飞碟）；毁坏（建筑物等）的内部( gut的第三人称单数 )；取出…的内脏n.勇气( gut的名词复数 )；内脏；消化道的下段；肠 | |
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8
crafty
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| adj.狡猾的，诡诈的 | |
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filthy
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| adj.卑劣的；恶劣的，肮脏的 | |
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stink
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| vi.发出恶臭；糟透，招人厌恶；n.恶臭 | |
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11
reeks
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| n.恶臭( reek的名词复数 )v.发出浓烈的臭气( reek的第三人称单数 )；散发臭气；发出难闻的气味 (of sth)；明显带有（令人不快或生疑的跡象） | |
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12
fumes
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| n.(强烈而刺激的)气味，气体 | |
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13
crouching
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| v.屈膝，蹲伏( crouch的现在分词 ) | |
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14
poked
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| v.伸出( poke的过去式和过去分词 )；戳出；拨弄；与（某人）性交 | |
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15
sniffed
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| v.以鼻吸气，嗅，闻( sniff的过去式和过去分词 )；抽鼻子（尤指哭泣、患感冒等时出声地用鼻子吸气）；抱怨，不以为然地说 | |
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16
twitched
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| vt.& vi.（使）抽动，（使）颤动（twitch的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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17
itched
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| v.发痒( itch的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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sniffing
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| n.探查法v.以鼻吸气，嗅，闻( sniff的现在分词 )；抽鼻子（尤指哭泣、患感冒等时出声地用鼻子吸气）；抱怨，不以为然地说 | |
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19
scent
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| n.气味，香味，香水，线索，嗅觉；v.嗅，发觉 | |
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20
trotting
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| 小跑，急走( trot的现在分词 )； 匆匆忙忙地走 | |
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21
rustling
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| n. 瑟瑟声，沙沙声 adj. 发沙沙声的 | |
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22
flattened
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| [医]（水）平扁的，弄平的 | |
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23
pricked
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| 刺，扎，戳( prick的过去式和过去分词 )； 刺伤； 刺痛； 使剧痛 | |
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24
murky
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| adj.黑暗的，朦胧的；adv.阴暗地，混浊地；n.阴暗；昏暗 | |
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25
speck
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| n.微粒，小污点，小斑点 | |
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26
tattered
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| adj.破旧的，衣衫破的 | |
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27
remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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28
poking
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| n. 刺，戳，袋 vt. 拨开，刺，戳 vi. 戳，刺，捅，搜索，伸出，行动散慢 | |
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29
flask
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| n.瓶，火药筒，砂箱 | |
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30
shovel
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| n.铁锨，铲子，一铲之量；v.铲，铲出 | |
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31
shovels
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| n.铲子( shovel的名词复数 )；锹；推土机、挖土机等的)铲；铲形部份v.铲子( shovel的第三人称单数 )；锹；推土机、挖土机等的)铲；铲形部份 | |
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32
stump
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| n.残株，烟蒂，讲演台；v.砍断，蹒跚而走 | |
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33
glum
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| adj.闷闷不乐的，阴郁的 | |
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34
dozed
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| v.打盹儿，打瞌睡( doze的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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35
sobbed
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| 哭泣，啜泣( sob的过去式和过去分词 )； 哭诉，呜咽地说 | |
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36
scrunch
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| v.压，挤压；扭曲（面部） | |
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crunch
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| n.关键时刻；艰难局面；v.发出碎裂声 | |
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38
downwards
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| adj./adv.向下的（地），下行的（地） | |
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39
scrunching
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| v.发出喀嚓声( scrunch的现在分词 )；蜷缩；压；挤压 | |
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40
clogged
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| （使）阻碍( clog的过去式和过去分词 )； 淤滞 | |
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41
machinery
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| n.(总称)机械，机器；机构 | |
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42
trotted
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| 小跑，急走( trot的过去分词 )； 匆匆忙忙地走 | |
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43
caterpillar
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| n.毛虫，蝴蝶的幼虫 | |
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44
deafening
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| adj. 振耳欲聋的, 极喧闹的 动词deafen的现在分词形式 | |
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45
crouched
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| v.屈膝，蹲伏( crouch的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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46
mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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47
dwarfish
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| a.像侏儒的，矮小的 | |
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48
maniacs
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| n.疯子（maniac的复数形式） | |
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49
racing
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| n.竞赛，赛马；adj.竞赛用的，赛马用的 | |
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50
hopping
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| n. 跳跃 动词hop的现在分词形式 | |
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51
crater
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| n.火山口，弹坑 | |
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52
jeered
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| v.嘲笑( jeer的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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53
obstinate
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| adj.顽固的，倔强的，不易屈服的，较难治愈的 | |
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54
determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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