译 序
第一章 河岸
第二章 大路朝天
第三章 野树林
第四章 班杰先生
第五章 家园之乐
第六章 托德先生
第七章 黎明之门前的吹笛人
第八章 托德的冒险
第九章 旅行者种种
第十章 托德的进一步冒险
第十一章 泪如夏日暴雨
第十二章 尤利西斯归来
Chapter I The River Bank
Chapter II The Open Road
Chapter III The Wild Wood
Chapter IV Mr. Badger
Chapter V Dulce Domum
Chapter VI Mr. Toad
Chapter VII The Piper at the Gates of Dawn
Chapter VIII Toad’s Adventures
Chapter IX Wayfarers All
Chapter X The Further Adventure of Toad
Chapter XI “Like Summer Tempests Came His Tears”
Chapter XII The Return of Ulysses
When Toad found himself immured in a dank and
noisome dungeon, and knew that all the grim darkness of a medieval fortress lay
between him and the outer world of sunshine and well-metalled high roads where
he had lately been so happy, disporting himself as if he had bought up every
road in England, he flung himself at full length on the floor, and shed bitter
tears, and abandoned himself to dark despair. “This is the end of everything”
he said, “at least it is the end of the career of Toad, which is the same
thing; the popular and handsome Toad, the rich and hospitable Toad, the Toad so
free and careless and debonair! How can I hope to be ever set at large again”
he said, “who have been imprisoned so justly for stealing so handsome a
motor-car in such an audacious manner, and for such lurid and imaginative
cheek, bestowed upon such a number of fat, red-faced policemen!” Here his sobs
choked him. “Stupid animal that I was” he said, “now I must languish in this
dungeon, till people who were proud to say they knew me, have forgotten the
very name of Toad! O wise old Badger!” he said, “O clever, intelligent Rat
and sensible Mole! What sound judgments, what a knowledge of men and matters
you possess! O unhappy and forsaken Toad!” With lamentations such as these he
passed his days and nights for several weeks, refusing his meals or intermediate
light refreshments, though the grim and ancient gaoler, knowing that Toad’s
pockets were well lined, frequently pointed out that many comforts, and indeed
luxuries, could by arrangement be sent in—at a price—from outside.
Now the gaoler had a daughter, a pleasant wench and
good-hearted, who assisted her father in the lighter duties of his post. She
was particularly fond of animals, and, besides her canary, whose cage hung on a
nail in the massive wall of the keep by day, to the great annoyance of prisoners
who relished an after-dinner nap, and was shrouded in an antimacassar on the
parlour table at night, she kept several piebald mice and a restless revolving
squirrel. This kind-hearted girl, pitying the misery of Toad, said to her father
one day, “Father! I can’t bear to see that poor beast so unhappy, and getting
so thin! You let me have the managing of him. You know how fond of animals I
am. I’ll make him eat from my hand, and sit up, and do all sorts of things.”
Her father replied that she could do what she liked
with him. He was tired of Toad, and his sulks and his airs and his meanness. So
that day she went on her errand of mercy, and knocked at the door of Toad’s
cell.
“Now, cheer up, Toad,” she said coaxingly, on
entering, “and sit up and dry your eyes and be a sensible animal. And do try
and eat a bit of dinner.
See, I’ve brought you some
of mine, hot from the oven!” It was bubble-and-squeak, between two plates, and
its fragrance filled the narrow cell. The penetrating smell of cabbage reached
the nose of Toad as he lay prostrate in his misery on the floor, and gave him
the idea for a moment that perhaps life was not such a blank and desperate
thing as he had imagined. But still he wailed, and kicked with his legs, and
refused to be comforted. So the wise girl retired for the time, but, of course,
a good deal of the smell of hot cabbage remained behind, as it will do, and
Toad, between his sobs, sniffed and reflected, and gradually began to think new
and inspiring thoughts: of chivalry, and poetry, and deeds still to be done; of
broad meadows, and cattle browsing in them, raked by sun and wind; of
kitchen-gardens, and straight herb-borders, and warm snap-dragon beset by bees;
and of the comforting clink of dishes set down on the table at Toad Hall, and
the scrape of chair-legs on the floor as every one pulled himself close up to
his work. The air of the narrow cell took a rosy tinge; he began to think of
his friends, and how they would surely be able to do something; of lawyers, and
how they would have enjoyed his case, and what an ass he had been not to get in
a few; and lastly, he thought of his own great cleverness and resource, and all
that he was capable of if he only gave his great mind to it; and the cure was
almost complete.
When the girl returned, some hours later, she carried
a tray, with a cup of fragrant tea steaming on it; and a plate piled up with
very hot buttered toast, cut thick, very brown on both sides, with the butter
running through the holes in it in great golden drops, like honey from the
honeycomb. The smell of that buttered toast simply talked to Toad, and with no
uncertain voice; talked of warm kitchens, of breakfasts on bright frosty
mornings, of cosy parlour firesides on winter evenings, when one’s ramble was
over and slippered feet were propped on the fender; of the purring of contented
cats, and the twitter of sleepy canaries. Toad sat up on end once more, dried
his eyes, sipped his tea and munched his toast, and soon began talking freely
about himself, and the house he lived in, and his doings there, and how
important he was, and what a lot his friends thought of him.
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