小学英语 英语故事(童话故事)The Happy Family 幸福的家庭

2021年1月26日发(作者：仍)
The
Happy
Family
幸福的家庭

The
biggest
leaf
we
have
in
this
country
is
certainly
the
burdock
leaf.
If
you
hold
one
in
front
of
your
little
stomach,
it's
just
like
a
real
apron;
and
in
rainy
weather,
if you lay it on your head, it does almost as well as an umbrella. It's really
amazingly
large.
Now,
a
burdock
never
grows
alone;
no,
when
you
see
one
you'll
always
see others around it. It's a splendid sight; and all this splendor is nothing more
than food for snails-the big white snails which the fine people in olden days used
to
have
made
into
fricassees.
When
they
had
eaten
them,
they
would
smack
their
lips
and
say,

How
good
that
is!
For
somehow
they
had
the
idea
that
the
snails
tasted
delicious. You see, these snails lived on the burdock leaves, and that's why the
burdock was first grown.
There was a certain old manor house where the people didn't eat snails any more.
The snails had almost died out, but the burdock hadn't. These grew and grew on all
the
walks
and
flower
beds-they
couldn't
be
stopped- until
the
whole
place
was
a
forest
of
burdocks.
Here
and
there
stood
an
apple
or
a
plum
tree,
but
except
for
that,
people
wouldn't have thought there had ever been a garden there. Everywhere was burdock,
and among the burdocks lived the last two incredibly old snails!
They
themselves
didn't
know
how
old
they
were,
but
they
could
remember
very
clearly
that once there had been a great many more of them, that they had descended from
a prominent
foreign family, and
they
knew
perfectly well that the
whole
forest
had
been planted just for them and their family.
They had never been away from home, but they did know that somewhere there was
something
called
a
manor
house,
and
that
there
you
were
boiled
until
you
turned
black,
and were laid on a silver dish; but what happened afterwards they hadn't the least
idea.
Furthermore,
they
couldn't
imagine
what
it
would
be
like
to
be
boiled
and
laid
on
a
silver
dish,
but
everyone
said
it
must
be
very
wonderful
and
a
great
distinction.
Neither the cockchafer nor the toad nor the earthworm, whom they asked about it,
could
give
them
any
information.
None
of
their
families
had
ever
been
boiled
or
laid
on silver dishes.
So
the
old
white
snails
knew
they
were
by
far
the
most
important
people
in
the
world.
The forest was there just for their sake, and the manor house existed just so that
they could be boiled and laid on silver dishes!
The two old snails led a quiet and happy life, and since they were childless they
had adopted a little orphan snail, which they were bringing up as their own child.
He
wouldn't
grow
very
large,
for
he
was
only
a
common
snail;
but
the
two
old
snails
-
and
especially
the
mother
snail- thought
it
was
easy
to
see
how
well
he
was
growing.
And she begged the father snail to touch the little snail's shell, if he couldn't
see it, and so he felt it and found that she was right.
One day it rained very hard.

Rum-dum- dum!

are also coming down here
straight down the
stalks, and it'll be wet down here before you know it. I'm certainly glad we have