Just So Stories for Little Children / Просто сказки. Книга для чтения на английском языке

I am the Most Wise Baviaan,
           saying in most wise tones,
‘Let us melt into the landscape[92]

—           just us two by our lones.’
People have come – in a carriage – calling.
But Mummy is there…
Yes, I can go if you take me —
           Nurse says she don’t care.
Let’s go up to the pig-sties[93]
           and sit on the farmyard rails!
Let’s say things to the bunnies[94],
           and watch ’em skitter their tails!
Let’s – oh, anything, Daddy,
           so long as it’s you and me,
And going truly exploring,
           and not being in till tea!
Here’s your boots (I’ve bought ’em),
           and here’s your cap and stick,
And here’s your pipe and tobacco.
           Oh, come along out of it – quick!

Questions and tasks

1. Why couldn’t the Leopard and the Ethiopian find any breakfast?

2. What was the Baviaan’s advice? Did the Leopard and the Ethiopian follow this advice?

3. How did the animals hide from the Leopard?

4. What was the use of spots for the Leopard?

5. How did the spots appear on the Leopard?

6. Retell the story.

The Elephant’s Child

On the High and Far-Off Times the Elephant, O Best Beloved, had no trunk[95]. He had only a blackish, bulgy nose, as big as a boot, that he could wriggle about from side to side; but he couldn’t pick up things with it. But there was one Elephant – a new Elephant – an Elephant’s Child – who was full of ’satiable curtiosity[96], and that means he asked ever so many questions. And he lived in Africa, and he filled all Africa with his ’satiable curtiosities. He asked his tall aunt, the Ostrich[97], why her tail-feathers grew just so, and his tall aunt the Ostrich spanked him with her hard, hard claw[98]. He asked his tall uncle, the Giraffe, what made his skin spotty, and his tall uncle, the Giraffe, spanked him with his hard, hard hoof. And still he was full of ’satiable curtiosity! He asked his broad aunt, the Hippopotamus, why her eyes were red, and his broad aunt, the Hippopotamus, spanked him with her broad, broad hoof; and he asked his hairy uncle, the Baboon, why melons tasted just so, and his hairy uncle, the Baboon, spanked him with his hairy, hairy paw[99]. And still he was full of ’satiable curtiosity! He asked questions about everything that he saw, or heard, or felt, or smelt, or touched, and all his uncles and his aunts spanked him. And still he was full of ’satiable curtiosity!

One fine morning in the middle of the Precession of the Equinoxes[100] this ’satiable Elephant’s Child asked a new fine question that he had never asked before. He asked, ‘What does the Crocodile have for dinner?’ Then everybody said, ‘Hush!’ in a loud and dretful tone[101], and they spanked him immediately and directly, without stopping for a long time.

By and by[102], when that was finished, he came upon Kolokolo Bird sitting in the middle of a wait-a-bit thorn-bush, and he said ‘My father has spanked me, and my mother has spanked me for my ’satiable curtiosity; and still I want to know what the Crocodile has for dinner!’

Then Kolokolo Bird said, with a mournful cry, ‘Go to the banks of the great grey-green, greasy Limpopo River, all set about fever-trees, and find out.’

That very next morning, when there was nothing left of the Equinoxes, because the Precession had preceded according to the precedent, this ’satiable Elephant’s Child took a hundred pounds of bananas (the little short red kind), and a hundred pounds of sugar-cane (the long purple kind, and seventeen melons (the greeny-crackly kind), and said to all his dear families, ‘Good-bye. I am going to the great grey-green, greasy Limpopo River, all set about with fever-trees, to find out what the Crocodile has for dinner.’ And they all spanked him once more for luck, though he asked them most politely to stop.

Then he went away, a little warm, but not at all astonished, eating melons, and throwing the rind about[103], because he could not pick it up.

He went from Graham’s Town to Kimberley, and from Kimberley to Khama’s country, and from Khama’s Country he went east by north, eating melons all the time, till at last he came to the banks of the great grey-green, greasy Limpopo River, all set about with fever-trees, precisely as Kolokolo Bird had said.