5. In the Woods

These young rabbits... must move out if they are to survive. In a wild and freestate they... stray sometimes for miles... wandering until they find a suitableenvironment.
R.M. Lockley, The Private Life of the RabbitIt was getting on toward moonset when they left the fields and entered thewood. Straggling, catching¹ up with one another, keeping more or less together,they had wandered over half a mile down the fields, always following the courseof the brook². Although Hazel guessed that they must now have gone further fromthe warren than any rabbit he had ever talked to, he was not sure whether theywere yet safely away; and it was while he was wondering -- not for the first time --whether he could hear sounds of pursuit that he first noticed the dark masses ofthe trees and the brook disappearing among them.
Rabbits avoid close woodland, where the ground is shady, damp and grasslessand they feel menaced by the undergrowth. Hazel did not care for the look of thetrees. Still, he thought, Holly³ would no doubt think twice before following theminto a place like that, and to keep beside the brook might well prove safer thanwandering about the fields in one direction and another, with the risk of findingthemselves, in the end, back at the warren. He decided⁴ to go straight into thewood without consulting Bigwig, and to trust that the rest would follow.
"If we don't run into any trouble and the brook takes us through the wood," hethought, "we really shall be clear of the warren and then we can look forsomewhere to rest for a bit. Most of them still seem to be more or less all right,but Fiver and Pipkin will have had as much as they can stand before long."From the moment he entered it, the wood seemed full of noises. There was asmell of damp leaves and moss⁵, and everywhere the splash of water wentwhispering about. Just inside, the brook made a little fall into a pool, and thesound, enclosed among the trees, echoed as though in a cave. Roosting birdsrustled overhead; the night breeze stirred the leaves; here and there a dead twigfell. And there were more sinister⁶, unidentified sounds from further away; soundsof movement.
To rabbits, everything unknown is dangerous. The first reaction is to startle,the second to bolt. Again and again they startled, until they were close toexhaustion. But what did these sounds mean and where, in this wilderness⁷, couldthey bolt to?
The rabbits crept, closer together. Their progress grew slower. Before long theylost the course of the brook, slipping across the moonlit patches as fugitives⁸ andhalting in the bushes with raised ears and staring eyes. The moon was low nowand the light, wherever it slanted⁹ through the trees, seemed thicker, older andmore yellow.
From a thick pile of dead leaves beneath a holly tree, Hazel looked down anarrow path lined on either side with fern and sprouting¹⁰ fireweed. The fernmoved slightly in the breeze, but along the path there was nothing to be seenexcept a scatter¹¹ of last year's fallen acorns¹² under an oak. What was in thebracken? What lay round the further bend? And what would happen to a rabbitwho left the shelter of the holly tree and ran down the path? He turned toDandelion beside him.
"You'd better wait here," he said. "When I get to the bend I'll stamp. But if Irun into trouble, get the others away."Without waiting for an answer, he ran into the open and down the path. A fewseconds brought him to the oak. He paused a moment, staring about him, andthen ran on to the bend. Beyond, the path was the same -- empty in the darkeningmoonlight and leading gently downhill into the deep shadow of a grove¹³ of ilextrees. Hazel stamped, and a few moments later Dandelion was beside him in thebracken. Even in the midst of his fear and strain it occurred to him thatDandelion must be very fast: he had covered the distance in a flash.
"Well done," whispered Dandelion. "Running our risks for us, are you -- likeEl-ahrairah?"*Hazel gave him a quick, friendly glance. It was warm praise and cheered him.
What Robin¹⁴ Hood¹⁵ is to the English and John Henry to the American Negroes,Elil-Hrair-Rah, or El-ahrairah -- The Prince with a Thousand Enemies -- is torabbits. Uncle Remus might well have heard of him, for some of El-ahrairah'sadventures are those of Brer Rabbit. For that matter, Odysseus himself mighthave borrowed a trick or two from the rabbit hero, for he is very old and wasnever at a loss for a trick to deceive his enemies. Once, so they say, he had to gethome by swimming across a river in which there was a large and hungry pike. El-ahrairah combed himself until he had enough fur to cover a clay rabbit, which hepushed into the water. The pike rushed at it, bit it and left it in disgust. After alittle, it drifted to the bank and El-ahrairah dragged it out and waited a whilebefore pushing it in again. After an hour of this, the pike left it alone, and when ithad done so for the fifth time, El-ahrairah swam across himself and went home.
Some rabbits say he controls the weather, because the wind, the damp and thedew are friends and instruments to rabbits against their enemies.
"Hazel, we'll have to stop here," said Bigwig, coming up between the panting,crouching bodies of the others. "I know it's not a good place, but Fiver and thisother half-sized fellow you've got here -- they're pretty well all in. They won't beable to go on if we don't rest."The truth was that every one of them was tired. Many rabbits spend all theirlives in the same place and never run more than a hundred yards at a stretch.
Even though they may live and sleep above ground for months at a time, theyprefer not to be out of distance of some sort of refuge that will serve for a hole.
They have two natural gaits -- the gentle, lolloping forward movement of thewarren on a summer evening and the lightning dash for cover that every humanhas seen at some time or other. It is difficult to imagine a rabbit plodding¹⁶ steadilyon: they are not built for it. It is true that young rabbits are great migrants andcapable of journeying for miles, but they do not take to it readily.
Hazel and his companions had spent the night doing everything that cameunnaturally to them, and this for the first time. They had been moving in a group,or trying to: actually, they had straggled widely at times. They had been trying tomaintain a steady pace, between hopping¹⁷ and running, and it had come hard.
Since entering the wood they had been in severe anxiety. Several were almosttharn -- that is, in that state of staring, glazed¹⁸ paralysis¹⁹ that comes over terrifiedor exhausted²⁰ rabbits, so that they sit and watch their enemies -- weasels orhumans -- approach to take their lives. Pipkin sat trembling under a fern, his earsdrooping on either side of his head. He held one paw forward in an awkward,unnatural way and kept licking it miserably²¹. Fiver was little better off. He stilllooked cheerful, but very weary. Hazel realized that until they were rested theywould all be safer where they were than stumbling along in the open with nostrength left to run from an enemy. But if they lay brooding, unable to feed or gounderground, all their troubles would come crowding into their hearts, their fearswould mount and they might very likely scatter, or even try to return to thewarren. He had an idea.
"Yes, all right, we'll rest here," he said, "Let's go in among this fern. Come on,Dandelion, tell us a story. I know you're handy that way. Pipkin here can't wait tohear it."Dandelion looked at Pipkin and realized what it was that Hazel was asking himto do. Choking back his own fear of the desolate²², grassless woodland, the before-dawn-returning owls²³ that they could hear some way off, and the extraordinary,rank animal smell that seemed to come from somewhere rather nearer, he began.
*The stresses are the same as in the phrase "Never say die."

1 catching   

adj.易传染的，有魅力的，迷人的，接住

参考例句：

• There are those who think eczema is catching.有人就是认为湿疹会传染。
• Enthusiasm is very catching.热情非常富有感染力。

2 brook   

n.小河，溪；v.忍受，容让

参考例句：

• In our room we could hear the murmur of a distant brook.在我们房间能听到远处小溪汩汩的流水声。
• The brook trickled through the valley.小溪涓涓流过峡谷。

3 holly   

n.[植]冬青属灌木

参考例句：

• I recently acquired some wood from a holly tree.最近我从一棵冬青树上弄了些木料。
• People often decorate their houses with holly at Christmas.人们总是在圣诞节时用冬青来装饰房屋。

4 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

5 moss   

n.苔，藓，地衣

参考例句：

• Moss grows on a rock.苔藓生在石头上。
• He was found asleep on a pillow of leaves and moss.有人看见他枕着树叶和苔藓睡着了。

6 sinister   

adj.不吉利的，凶恶的，左边的

参考例句：

• There is something sinister at the back of that series of crimes.在这一系列罪行背后有险恶的阴谋。
• Their proposals are all worthless and designed out of sinister motives.他们的建议不仅一钱不值，而且包藏祸心。

7 wilderness   

n.杳无人烟的一片陆地、水等，荒漠

参考例句：

• She drove the herd of cattle through the wilderness.她赶着牛群穿过荒野。
• Education in the wilderness is not a matter of monetary means.荒凉地区的教育不是钱财问题。

8 fugitives   

n.亡命者，逃命者( fugitive的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Three fugitives from the prison are still at large. 三名逃犯仍然未被抓获。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Members of the provisional government were prisoners or fugitives. 临时政府的成员或被捕或逃亡。 来自演讲部分

9 slanted   

有偏见的； 倾斜的

参考例句：

• The sun slanted through the window. 太阳斜照进窗户。
• She had slanted brown eyes. 她有一双棕色的丹凤眼。

10 sprouting   

v.发芽( sprout的现在分词 )；抽芽；出现；（使）涌现出

参考例句：

• new leaves sprouting from the trees 树上长出的新叶
• They were putting fresh earth around sprouting potato stalks. 他们在往绽出新芽的土豆秧周围培新土。 来自名作英译部分

11 scatter   

vt.撒，驱散，散开；散布/播；vi.分散，消散

参考例句：

• You pile everything up and scatter things around.你把东西乱堆乱放。
• Small villages scatter at the foot of the mountain.村庄零零落落地散布在山脚下。

12 acorns   

n.橡子，栎实( acorn的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Great oaks from little acorns grow. 万丈高楼平地起。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Welcome to my new website!It may not look much at the moment, but great oaks from little acorns grow! 欢迎来到我的新网站。它现在可能微不足道，不过万丈高楼平地起嘛。 来自《简明英汉词典》

13 grove   

n.林子，小树林，园林

参考例句：

• On top of the hill was a grove of tall trees.山顶上一片高大的树林。
• The scent of lemons filled the grove.柠檬香味充满了小树林。

14 robin   

n.知更鸟，红襟鸟

参考例句：

• The robin is the messenger of spring.知更鸟是报春的使者。
• We knew spring was coming as we had seen a robin.我们看见了一只知更鸟，知道春天要到了。

15 hood   

n.头巾，兜帽，覆盖；v.罩上，以头巾覆盖

参考例句：

• She is wearing a red cloak with a hood.她穿着一件红色带兜帽的披风。
• The car hood was dented in.汽车的发动机罩已凹了进去。

16 plodding   

a.proceeding in a slow or dull way

参考例句：

• They're still plodding along with their investigation. 他们仍然在不厌其烦地进行调查。
• He is plodding on with negotiations. 他正缓慢艰难地进行着谈判。

17 hopping   

n. 跳跃 动词hop的现在分词形式

参考例句：

• The clubs in town are really hopping. 城里的俱乐部真够热闹的。
• I'm hopping over to Paris for the weekend. 我要去巴黎度周末。

18 glazed   

adj.光滑的，像玻璃的；上过釉的；呆滞无神的v.装玻璃( glaze的过去式)；上釉于，上光；（目光）变得呆滞无神

参考例句：

• eyes glazed with boredom 厌倦无神的眼睛
• His eyes glazed over at the sight of her. 看到她时，他的目光就变得呆滞。 来自《简明英汉词典》

19 paralysis   

n.麻痹(症)；瘫痪(症)

参考例句：

• The paralysis affects his right leg and he can only walk with difficulty.他右腿瘫痪步履维艰。
• The paralysis affects his right leg and he can only walk with difficulty.他右腿瘫痪步履维艰。

20 exhausted   

adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的

参考例句：

• It was a long haul home and we arrived exhausted.搬运回家的这段路程特别长，到家时我们已筋疲力尽。
• Jenny was exhausted by the hustle of city life.珍妮被城市生活的忙乱弄得筋疲力尽。

21 miserably   

adv.痛苦地；悲惨地；糟糕地；极度地

参考例句：

• The little girl was wailing miserably. 那小女孩难过得号啕大哭。
• It was drizzling, and miserably cold and damp. 外面下着毛毛细雨，天气又冷又湿，令人难受。 来自《简明英汉词典》

22 desolate   

adj.荒凉的，荒芜的；孤独的，凄凉的；v.使荒芜，使孤寂

参考例句：

• The city was burned into a desolate waste.那座城市被烧成一片废墟。
• We all felt absolutely desolate when she left.她走后，我们都觉得万分孤寂。

23 owls   

n.猫头鹰( owl的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• 'Clumsy fellows,'said I; 'they must still be drunk as owls.' “这些笨蛋，”我说，“他们大概还醉得像死猪一样。” 来自英汉文学 - 金银岛
• The great majority of barn owls are reared in captivity. 大多数仓鸮都是笼养的。 来自辞典例句