Скотный двор / Animal Farm

First came the three dogs, Bluebell, Jessie, and Pincher, and then the pigs, who settled down in the straw immediately in front of the platform. The hens perched themselves on the window-sills, the pigeons fluttered up to the rafters, the sheep and cows lay down behind the pigs and began to chew the cud.

The two cart-horses, Boxer and Clover, came in together, walking very slowly and setting down their vast hairy hoofs with great care. Clover was a stout motherly mare. Boxer was an enormous beast, nearly eighteen hands high, and as strong as two ordinary horses.

A white stripe down his nose gave him a stupid appearance, and in fact he was not very intelligent. But he was universally respected for his steadiness of character and tremendous powers of work.

After the horses came Muriel, the white goat, and Benjamin, the donkey. Benjamin was the oldest animal on the farm, and the worst tempered. He seldom talked, and when he did, it was usually to make some cynical remark. For instance, he said:

В«God gave him a tail to keep the flies off, but I prefer to have no tail and no fliesВ».

Among the animals on the farm he never laughed. He said he saw nothing to laugh at. Nevertheless, he was devoted to Boxer. They usually spent their Sundays together in the small paddock beyond the orchard, grazing side by side and never speaking.

The two horses lay down when a brood of ducklings, which lost their mother, filed into the barn, cheeping feebly and wandering from side to side to find some place.

Clover made a sort of wall round them with her great foreleg, and the ducklings nestled down inside it and promptly fell asleep.

At the last moment Mollie, the foolish, pretty white mare who drew Mr. Jones’s trap, came daintily in, chewing at a lump of sugar. She took a place near the front and began flirting her white mane, hoping to draw attention to her red ribbons.

Last of all came the cat, who looked round, as usual, for the warmest place, and finally squeezed herself in between Boxer and Clover.

There she purred contentedly throughout Major’s speech without listening to a word of what he was saying.

All the animals were now present except Moses, the tame raven, who slept on a perch behind the back door. When Major saw that they all made themselves comfortable and were waiting attentively, he cleared his throat and began:

В«Comrades, you heard already about the strange dream that I had last night. But I will come to the dream later.