Joke Collection Website - Mood Talk - The main content of Chapter 4 of The Wind in the Willows

The main content of Chapter 4 of The Wind in the Willows

The Wind in the Willows Chapter 4 - Mr. Badger Main content:

They waited patiently, as if for a long time, and kept stamping their feet on the snow to keep their feet warm. . Finally, I finally heard the sound of kicking footsteps inside, slowly approaching from far away, and came to the door. The sound, as the Mole said to the Rat, was like someone walking in felt slippers, which were too big and worn out. The Mole was very clever, and what he said was absolutely true, and that was exactly what happened.

The sound of the door bolt being pulled was heard inside, and the door opened a few inches wide, just enough to reveal a long mouth and a pair of sleepy and blinking eyes.

"Humph, if this happens again next time," said a hoarse and suspicious voice, "I'm going to be really angry. Who is this? In the middle of the night, in this kind of weather, it's hard to wake others up. Speak!"

"Badger," cried the Rat, "please let us in, Rat, and my friend the Mole, us. The two are lost in the snow."

"Why, Rat, dear boy!" cried the Badger, changing his tone. "Come in, you two. Oops, you must be freezing. How bad! Lost your way in the snow! And in the middle of the night in the wild forest! Please come in."

Two The animals stumbled over each other in their haste to squeeze in, and were delighted to hear the door close behind them.

The badger was wearing a long dressing gown, and the slippers on his feet were indeed very shabby. He held a flat candlestick in his paws and was probably about to go back to his bedroom to sleep when they knocked on the door. He looked down at them kindly and patted them both on the head. "A night like this is not the time for little animals to go out," he said lovingly. "Rat, I'm afraid you are playing some trick again. Come with me to the kitchen. There's a good fire there, and there's dinner. , everything."

The badger held the candle and walked in front, and they followed closely behind, touching each other's elbows knowingly to indicate that something good was coming, and walked into a long road. After walking down a long, dark and dilapidated corridor, we arrived at a room that looked like a central hall. From here, you can see other tunnels that branch out like branches, looking deep and mysterious with no end in sight. But there are many doors in the hall - heavy oak doors that look cozy. Badger pushed open one of the doors, and in an instant they found themselves in a large kitchen with a red and warm fire.

The floor is paved with red bricks and has been worn for a long time. There is firewood burning in the large fireplace. Two pairs of lovely hearths are fixed deeply into the wall. The cold wind will never blow backwards. Come in. On both sides of the fireplace, facing each other, are a pair of high-backed benches, specially prepared for guests who like to have long conversations around the fire. In the middle of the kitchen, there stood a long unpainted wooden table on a stand with benches on both sides. At one end of the dining table, an armchair has been pushed back into place, and the leftovers of Mr. Badger's dinner are spread out on the table. The meal is ordinary, but very sumptuous. At one end of the kitchen, stacks of spotless dishes were placed on the cabinets, winking at you; hams, bundles of dried vegetables, bags of onions, and baskets of eggs hung from the rafters above. This place is very suitable for the heroes who have returned from triumph to gather and have a banquet; dozens of tired farmers sit around the table, drinking happily and singing loudly to celebrate the harvest; and the two or three friends who are rich in elegance can also sit and sit casually , eat, drink, smoke and chat comfortably. The ocher tile floor smiles at the smoke-filled ceiling; the oak benches that have been polished over time look at each other happily; the dishes on the cupboard grin at the pots and pans on the dish rack; And the cheerful firewood flickered and danced, illuminating everything in the house equally.

The kind badger pushed the two of them to sit down on a high-backed bench, told them to face the fire, and asked them to take off their wet clothes and boots.

Some time ago, all the animals' muscles were tense and their physical strength was exhausted to the extreme. So, after the hard work of the previous period of days and nights, all the animals rested.

"That's it!" said the Badger. "However, when the new year begins and the nights get shorter, people won't be able to lie down in the middle of the night, and they hope to get up and move around as soon as dawn breaks. By then - you understand!"

The two animals nodded solemnly. They understand!

"Well, then," continued the Badger, "we—that is, you and I, and our friend the Mole—we shall keep a tight rein on Toad. He shall not let him run wild. To bring him back to his senses, if necessary, we must make him a wise toad—Hey, Rat, you're asleep!"

"It's nothing!" The Rat trembled violently and woke up.

"He fell asleep two or three times after supper," said the Mole with a smile. He himself was quite sober and even energetic, although he didn't understand why this was the case. Of course, this is because he is an animal that lives underground, and the location of the badger's house is just what he wants, so he feels comfortable and comfortable. As for the River Rat, he slept in a bedroom with an open window every night. Outside the window was a breezy river, so he naturally felt that the air here was still and stuffy.

"Well, it's time to go to bed," said the Badger, getting up and picking up the candlestick. "You two come with me, and I'll take you to your rooms. There's no need to get up in a hurry tomorrow morning - you can take care of yourself during breakfast time."

He led the two animals to a long room. The room is half bedroom and half storage room. The badger's winter supplies can indeed be seen everywhere, occupying half of the room - piles of apples, radishes, potatoes, baskets of dried fruits, jars of honey; but on the floor of the other half of the room, there are two white sheets The small bed looks very soft and inviting. Although the bedding on the bed was rough, it was very clean and smelled of a lovely lavender scent. It only took half a minute for the Mole and the Rat to throw off their clothes and crawl into the quilt, feeling extremely happy and satisfied.

Following the instructions of the caring badger, the two sleepy animals went downstairs for breakfast late the next day. They saw that a bright fire was burning in the stove, and two little hedgehogs were sitting on the bench next to the dining table, eating oatmeal from wooden bowls. As soon as he saw them coming in, the hedgehog immediately put down his spoon, stood up, and bowed respectfully to them.

"Okay, sit down, sit down," the Rat said happily, "and go on to eat your porridge. Where did you two little guys come from? You were lost in the snow. "Really?"

"Yes, sir," said the older hedgehog respectfully. "Me and this little Billy were looking for a way to go to school - Mom insisted on us going to school, saying the weather was always like this - and of course we got lost, sir. Billy was young and timid, and he was scared. We cried. Finally, we happened to come to the back door of Mr. Badger’s house, so we had the courage to knock on the door, sir, because everyone knows that Mr. Badger is a kind-hearted gentleman——”

"I understand," said the Rat, cutting himself some slices of bacon, while the Mole cracked some eggs into the pan. "How's the weather outside? You don't have to call me 'sir' or 'sir' all the time," the Rat added.

"Oh, no, sir, the snow is terribly deep," said the hedgehog. "Gentlemen like you can't go out today."

"Where is Mr. Badger?" asked the Mole, who was warming coffee on the fire.

"He has gone to his study, sir," replied the hedgehog. "He said he was very busy this morning and did not want anyone to disturb him."

This explanation was not surprising to everyone present. Everyone naturally understands it. In fact, as we mentioned before, you live an extremely intense and active life for half of the year, and half or fully asleep for the other half of the year. In the latter period, if there are guests at home, , or there is something that needs to be done, it’s better to just say that you are sleepy. Too many explanations like this will bore people.

"People came, prospered for a while, built a lot of construction - and then left. They came and went as usual. But we never left. I heard that long, long before that city existed, here There are badgers. There are still badgers here. We may move out for a while, but we always come back. ” >

"Well, what happens after those humans finally leave?" asked the Mole.

"After they left," Badger continued, "year after year, violent storms continued to erode this place, and we badgers might have contributed to it. Who knows? So the city sank. , sank, sank, bit by bit collapsed, flattened, disappeared. Then, bit by bit, it grew up, grew, grew, the seeds grew into saplings, and the saplings grew into big trees, thorns and ferns. Plants came to join in the fun. The humus was thickened and drained away; over time, the streams carried silt and covered the ground with the high tide, and our home was ready again, so we moved in. The same thing happened on the ground above. All kinds of animals came, settled down, and thrived. The animals never worried about the past. They were too busy. The hills are undulating and full of caves; this is also good. In the future, humans may move in and live there for a while. This is very likely, but the animals are not worried about the future. When it comes to animals, there are always good and bad, good and not bad - I won't mention their names. I think you know something about them now. "Yes."

"Exactly," said the Mole, shuddering slightly.

"Come on, come on," the badger patted him on the shoulder and said, "This is the first time you have come into contact with them. In fact, they are not really that bad; let others live if we live. . However, I will say hello to them tomorrow, so that you will not encounter any trouble in the future. All my friends can travel freely in this area, otherwise, I will find out the reason. !”

When they returned to the kitchen, they saw the Rat pacing back and forth restlessly. The underground air oppressed him and made his nerves tense, as if he was really worried that if he didn't go back to take care of the river, the river would run away. He put on his coat and thrust a pack of pistols into his belt. "Come on, Mole," he said eagerly as soon as he saw Mole and Badger, "we must go back while it's daylight. We can't spend another night in the wild forest."

"This can't be done. Question, dear friend," said the Otter. "I'll go with you. I know every road even if I'm blindfolded. If any guy deserves a beating, I'll give him a good one."

"You don't have to, Rat. Trouble," said Badger quietly. "My passage is much longer than you think. I also have many escape holes, leading to the edge of the woods from several directions, but I don't want outsiders to know. If you really want to leave, you can take one For now, feel free to settle down and sit still for a while." However, the Rat was still anxious to get back to tending his river, so the Badger lit up his lantern again and led the way through a winding road. The tunnel is damp, stuffy, and dripping with water. Part of it has a dome, and part of it is cut out of solid rock. After walking a long and tiring walk, which seemed to be several miles long, at last, through the messy vegetation hanging at the tunnel exit, I finally saw fragments of skylight. The badger hurriedly said goodbye to them, quickly pushed them out of the hole, and then used vines, broken branches, and dead leaves to hide the entrance of the hole, leaving no traces as much as possible, and turned back.

They found themselves standing at the edge of the wild forest. Behind, rocks, thorns, and tree roots are piled up and entwined with each other in a chaotic manner. In front, there are endless quiet fields, with rows of hedges, darkened by the snow, lining the edges of the fields. Going further, you can see the old river shining brightly, and the winter sun is red and hanging low in the sky. Otter knew all the trails, and he was responsible for leading them in a straight line to a gate in the distance.

They rested there and looked back, only to see the huge wild forest, densely layered, dense and gloomy, embedded in the endless white wilderness, looking so scary. They turned around in unison and hurried home, running towards the fire and the familiar things illuminated by the firelight, and towards the singing river outside the window. They were familiar with the nature of the river, and they trusted it because it would never do anything strange that alarmed them.

The Mole hurried on, eager to get home and return to the things he knew and loved. Only then did he clearly see that he was originally an animal that belonged to cultivated fields and hedges. He was closely related to the furrows, the pastures where he often came and went, and the tree-lined paths where he lingered in the dusk. It is a garden lawn cultivated by people. As for harsh conditions, dogged endurance, or actual conflict with the raging nature, let other animals endure it. He must be smarter and stick to his paradise. It was the place where his ancestors had lived and thrived for generations, and it also had its own various adventures and adventures, which were enough to entertain him for a lifetime.