THE PLUMBER, THE PLASTERER, THE PAINTER

I. A Visit to a Little Town

“I have an errand to do just outside the city limits,” said Mr. Duwell one pleasant Saturday morning. “Would you like to go with me, Wallace?”

“I certainly should,” said the boy.

In a few minutes father and son were on the electric car, speeding toward Oldtown.

When there, they walked up the main street, which was lined with rows of shabby houses, badly in need of paint. Little pools of standing¹ water lay in the gutters².

“What an awful smell! I should think it would[177] make people sick! And look at the flies!” exclaimed Wallace.

“I have no doubt it does make people sick,” said Mr. Du well. “Flies and mosquitoes breed very rapidly in such places.”

“Flies and mosquitoes carry disease germs, Mr. Emerson says,” observed Wallace.

“So they do; they are more dangerous to health than poi-son-ous snakes,” his father said.

“Why don’t the people clean their gutters?” asked Wallace.

“I suppose they do sometimes,” replied his father; “but Oldtown will never be clean and healthy while the dirty water from the houses is drained into the streets and alleys³. Waste water must be carried off by means of pipes into a sewer⁴. That is the work of the plumber⁵. A good plumber is a health officer.”

“What a lot of people it takes to keep things going right, father! This town certainly does need a plumber,” remarked Wallace.

This remark seemed to please Mr. Duwell very much.

“How would you like to move to Oldtown, Wallace?” asked his father when their errand was finished and they were riding home.

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“I shouldn’t mind,” said Wallace, “if I were a plumber.”
II. At Home

When Ruth saw them coming, she ran to meet them.

“What do you think, father!” she exclaimed; “the plasterer came while you were gone, and mended the kitchen ceiling. Mother is so pleased! Come and look at it!”

“That’s very well done,” said Mr. Duwell, examining the neat patch over the large hole which the falling chimney had made. “But it makes the whole room look as if it needed a new coat of paint. What do you think, mother?”

“I think it would make me a better cook to have a nice clean kitchen,” said Mrs. Duwell, smiling.

“You couldn’t be a better cook, mother!” Wallace said, eyeing the good meal which was ready to be put on the dining table.

“That is what we all think, Wallace,” said his father; “and we think, too, that such a good cook deserves a better kitchen. So on Monday I will ask the painter to see about doing the walls and woodwork.”

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III. The New Kitchen

When the men had finished their work the kitchen was so changed that it scarcely knew itself, as Wallace said.

Instead of dim walls and dull-gray paint, everything was white and blue. A shining white sink with two bright nickel spigots was standing proudly in one corner of the room.

Mrs. Duwell had just finished hanging a white dotted muslin curtain at the window over the sink when Ruth entered.

“Oh, mother, doesn’t that look lovely!” she exclaimed.

“I thought such a bright clean kitchen deserved a clean new curtain,” said her mother.

“Isn’t the kitchen beautiful!” Ruth went on. “It seems like living in a fairy tale—as though we had wakened up to find things changed by magic.”

“It does, in a way,” agreed her mother; “but, really, they were every-day fairies who brought about these changes and turned ugliness into beauty.”

“I think I know their names,” Ruth said, laughing; “Mr. Plumber, Mr. Plasterer, and Mr. Painter.”

“Why, how did you guess?” said her mother.

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QUESTIONS

Did the plumber ever come to your house?

What did he do?

What would have happened if you could not have found a plumber?

None of us would like to live in a town where there are no plumbers⁶. Why not?

Shut your eyes and try to imagine how the Duwell family’s kitchen looked before the workmen began to work; now imagine that they have finished their work. Tell how different it looks.

Have workmen ever made such changes in your home?

Can you name some other people besides the carpenter, the bricklayer, the plumber, the plasterer, and the painter who help give us shelter?

1 standing   

n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的

参考例句：

• After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
• They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。

2 gutters   

（路边）排水沟( gutter的名词复数 )； 阴沟； （屋顶的）天沟； 贫贱的境地

参考例句：

• Gutters lead the water into the ditch. 排水沟把水排到这条水沟里。
• They were born, they grew up in the gutters. 他们生了下来，以后就在街头长大。

3 alleys   

胡同，小巷( alley的名词复数 )； 小径

参考例句：

• I followed him through a maze of narrow alleys. 我紧随他穿过一条条迂迴曲折的窄巷。
• The children lead me through the maze of alleys to the edge of the city. 孩子们领我穿过迷宫一般的街巷，来到城边。

4 sewer   

n.排水沟，下水道

参考例句：

• They are tearing up the street to repair a sewer. 他们正挖开马路修下水道。
• The boy kicked a stone into the sewer. 那个男孩把一石子踢进了下水道。

5 plumber   

n.(装修水管的)管子工

参考例句：

• Have you asked the plumber to come and look at the leaking pipe?你叫管道工来检查漏水的管子了吗？
• The plumber screwed up the tap by means of a spanner.管子工用板手把龙头旋紧。

6 plumbers   

n.管子工，水暖工( plumber的名词复数 )；[美][口]（防止泄密的）堵漏人员

参考例句：

• Plumbers charge by the hour for their work. 水管工人的工作是以小时收费的。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Plumbers, carpenters, and other workmen finished the new house quickly. 管道工、木工及其他工匠很快完成了这幢新房子。 来自辞典例句