CHAPTER 3 LITTLE JOE OTTER’S HOME

 No matter how you love to roam

 

There comes a time you want a home.

 

               Little Joe Otter¹.

 

Now though Peter Rabbit didn’t know it, he had walked right straight over the home of Little Joe Otter. Many other little forest people had walked over that home without guessing it. You see, Little Joe is just as smart in making a home as he is in everything else. Little Joe believes that a home is just for those who live there, and therefore that it is a secret which no one else should know. He had found Mrs. Joe far away on the Big River and had brought her back with him up the Laughing Brook² to the Smiling Pool and through the Smiling Pool farther up the Laughing Brook to the place he had picked out for a home. They had come right through the Smiling Pool while Grandfather Frog was sitting on his green lily pad and Jerry Muskrat³ was sitting on the Big Rock talking to Peter Rabbit, who was sitting on the bank. Only once had they shown their little brown heads above the water, and that was when Peter and Jerry and Grandfather Frog had thought they saw double. You see, Mrs. Joe was very, very shy, and so Little Joe wanted her to become acquainted with the Laughing Brook and her new home before he introduced her to his friends and neighbors.

 

The place he had chosen for a home was close beside one of the deepest pools in the Laughing Brook. Growing close to the bank was a big tree with spreading roots. The bank was steep and mossy. All about grew the Green Forest. It was very lovely there. Also it was very quiet, and you probably would have called it very lonely. But it was just such a place as Otters⁴ love.

 

“Oh!” cried Mrs. Joe, when she saw it. “Is this where our home is to be?”

 

“Yes, my dear,” replied Little Joe. “That is, it is if you like it. I thought we could make our house with a back door between two of the roots of that old tree, and with a front door deep down under water. By and by, if we want, we can have a slippery slide down the bank. There are plenty of fish in the Laughing Brook and we are far enough in the Green Forest not to have visitors very often.”

 

Mrs. Joe dived into the little pool. She was gone a long time and Little Joe waited on the bank anxiously. When she came up she looked very happy. “It is perfectly⁵ lovely!” she cried. “It is the finest place for a home I ever have seen. Let’s begin to make it right away, Little Joe!”

 

Little Joe didn’t wait for her to change her mind. He remembered how many times Polly Chuck had changed her mind before Johnny Chuck succeeded in getting her to let him dig their home under the old apple tree in the far corner of the Old Orchard⁶. “We’ll begin right off,” said he. And that is just what they did do.

 

Now you know Little Joe Otter can stay under water a long time. Mrs. Joe showed him just where she wanted the front door, deep down under water. Then they took turns making a long, nice hallway, slanting⁷ up from that under-water doorway⁸. When it was high enough to be wholly above water they made the nicest little room, and then began a doorway which would lead out between two roots of the big tree. At first they didn’t open this doorway, because you see they had no need of it. They just made the hall and left the door closed, so there wasn’t a thing to show where their home was. When they wanted to go out, they just slid down their front hallway into the little pool and then swam clear across it before they came up. This was so that if any sharp eyes happened to see them, they never would guess where they had come from. When it was all done, they had just the best time ever.

1 otter   

n.水獭

参考例句：

• The economists say the competition otter to the brink of extinction.经济学家们说，竞争把海獭推到了灭绝的边缘。
• She collared my black wool coat with otter pelts.她把我的黑呢上衣镶上了水獭领。

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 muskrat   

n.麝香鼠

参考例句：

• Muskrat fur almost equals beaver fur in quality.麝鼠皮在质量上几乎和海獭皮不相上下。
• I saw a muskrat come out of a hole in the ice.我看到一只麝鼠从冰里面钻出来。

4 otters   

n.（水）獭( otter的名词复数 )；獭皮

参考例句：

• An attempt is being made to entice otters back to the river. 人们正试图把水獭引诱回河里去。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Otters are believed to have been on Earth for 90 million years. 水獭被认为存活在地球上已经9千多万年。 来自互联网

5 perfectly   

adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The witnesses were each perfectly certain of what they said.证人们个个对自己所说的话十分肯定。
• Everything that we're doing is all perfectly above board.我们做的每件事情都是光明正大的。

6 orchard   

n.果园，果园里的全部果树，(美俚)棒球场

参考例句：

• My orchard is bearing well this year.今年我的果园果实累累。
• Each bamboo house was surrounded by a thriving orchard.每座竹楼周围都是茂密的果园。

7 slanting   

倾斜的，歪斜的

参考例句：

• The rain is driving [slanting] in from the south. 南边潲雨。
• The line is slanting to the left. 这根线向左斜了。

8 doorway   

n.门口，(喻)入门；门路，途径

参考例句：

• They huddled in the shop doorway to shelter from the rain.他们挤在商店门口躲雨。
• Mary suddenly appeared in the doorway.玛丽突然出现在门口。