II OLD LADY WILDCAT'S FEAST

 Sister Alligator¹ and Miss Mud-Turtle had always been exceedingly good friends, and always helped each other out of trouble. One day Miss Mud-Turtle flopped² over to Sister Alligator in great excitement.

 

"Look here, my friend, I'm going to have a picnic over on the other side of your big pond, and I want you to help me!" she said.

 

"Well, I'm right here to do what I can for you. Just tell me of what service I may be," replied Sister Alligator, as she lazily opened her sleepy eyes.

 

"You are a wonderfully good neighbor," declared Miss Mud-Turtle, "and I was just wondering if you would mind carrying all my young friends, the swamp³ turtles, across the pond on your big back? It would take you only a minute to swim us across, and if we tried to go around the pond, I am afraid Old Lady Wildcat might catch us on the way. You know she is always trying to get the best of us mud-turtles."

 

Sister Alligator's sleepy eyes opened wider.

 

"I have the very idea!" she exclaimed. "Just send Old Lady Wildcat an invitation to come to the picnic. Then I'll swim out into the pond and dive under and drown her, for all of you mud-turtles can swim."

 

Miss Mud-Turtle laughed so hard she had to wipe the tears from her eyes.

 

"Sister Alligator, your sleepy old head is not on your body for nothing! You surely have some brains! That is the very idea for disposing of Old Lady Wildcat! I'll make a carpet out of her soft hide for my young friends to play on before the sun goes down."

 

So Miss Mud-Turtle sent an invitation to Old Lady Wildcat, all written on a grape leaf in grand style. It told of the big dinner they were to have, and where it was to be, and that Sister Alligator would carry them all across the pond on her back.

 

When Old Lady Wildcat got the invitation she mewed to Mr. 'Possum, who had brought it, that she would be there all right, but that they must be very careful when they carried her over the pond, as her rheumatism⁴ was bad.

 

Then, when Mr. 'Possum went to take her message to Miss Mud-Turtle, Old Lady Wildcat laughed so loudly she had to hide her face with her paws for fear Miss Mud-Turtle would hear her. She was just planning how to get the best of Miss Mud-Turtle.

 

"Whenever I dine⁵ with low-down mud-turtles and alligators⁶ it is time for me to lose this fine coat of mine. I suppose they forget who I am! Ha! What would all my grandchildren think of their grandmother dining with mud-turtles!"

 

Then she began laughing again, and her grandchildren, who were sleeping away up in the branches of a big pine-tree, came down to see what had tickled⁷ her so.

 

Old Lady Wildcat was holding her sides and dancing about in glee.

 

"Oh, children," she laughed, "we're going to have some fun! Old Miss Mud-Turtle is trying to get your grandmother to dine with her across the pond. Get yourselves ready for the big feast⁸, and I'll start over on Sister Alligator's back, while you all go on ahead and eat up the dinner."

 

"Hooray!" cried the young wildcats. "We'll slip along behind to see how you get started, and then we'll run around the pond and get the dinner before Miss Mud-Turtle and Sister Alligator can come."

 

So Old Lady Wildcat loped down to the pond, and there were Miss Mud-Turtle and Sister Alligator. All the little mud-turtles climbed on the alligator raft.

 

"Be very careful, Mrs. Wildcat," Sister Alligator cautioned⁹, "not to wet your feet. You might take cold."

 

Old Lady Wildcat smiled pleasantly and jumped; and then away swam Sister Alligator.

 

It was fine riding till they got to about the middle of the pond. Then Sister Alligator stopped.

 

"I'm very sorry," she said politely, "but I have the cramps¹⁰, ooh! ooh! I must drop to the bottom of the pond."

 

And down she dived.

 

But Old Lady Wildcat was too quick for her. She sprang up into the air and caught a grapevine, climbed up on it, and finally got to land. Then she ran through the woods to where her grandchildren were, and there they had the greatest feast you ever saw.

 

Finally, just as Sister Alligator and Miss Mud-Turtle with all the children came in sight, Old Lady Wildcat climbed up into a tree and laughed and mewed at them.

 

And this is what she said:

 

"Never try to fool folks, Sister Alligator and Miss Mud-Turtle, by plotting against them, for you'll find that you are only fooling yourselves!"

1 alligator   

n.短吻鳄(一种鳄鱼)

参考例句：

• She wandered off to play with her toy alligator.她开始玩鳄鱼玩具。
• Alligator skin is five times more costlier than leather.鳄鱼皮比通常的皮革要贵5倍。

2 flopped   

v.（指书、戏剧等）彻底失败( flop的过去式和过去分词 )；（因疲惫而）猛然坐下；（笨拙地、不由自主地或松弛地）移动或落下；砸锅

参考例句：

• Exhausted, he flopped down into a chair. 他筋疲力尽，一屁股坐到椅子上。
• It was a surprise to us when his play flopped. 他那出戏一败涂地，出乎我们的预料。 来自《简明英汉词典》

3 swamp   

n.沼泽，湿地；v.淹没，陷于沼泽

参考例句：

• The swamp teems with mosquitoes.这片沼泽地蚊子多极了。
• The water in the swamp is foul.沼泽中的水很臭。

4 rheumatism   

n.风湿病

参考例句：

• The damp weather plays the very devil with my rheumatism.潮湿的天气加重了我的风湿病。
• The hot weather gave the old man a truce from rheumatism.热天使这位老人暂时免受风湿病之苦。

5 dine   

vi.吃饭，进餐；vt.宴请

参考例句：

• I wish I could afford to dine off fresh meat every day.我要是能天天吃到新鲜的肉就好了。
• Let's dine out tonight，I'm too tired to cook.我太累了，不想做饭，今晚咱们到外面吃吧。

6 alligators   

n.短吻鳄( alligator的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Two alligators rest their snouts on the water's surface. 两只鳄鱼的大嘴栖息在水面上。 来自辞典例句
• In the movement of logs by water the lumber industry was greatly helped by alligators. 木材工业过去在水上运输木料时所十分倚重的就是鳄鱼。 来自辞典例句

7 tickled   

（使）发痒( tickle的过去式和过去分词 )； （使）愉快，逗乐

参考例句：

• We were tickled pink to see our friends on television. 在电视中看到我们的一些朋友，我们高兴极了。
• I tickled the baby's feet and made her laugh. 我胳肢孩子的脚，使她发笑。

8 feast   

n.盛宴，筵席，节日

参考例句：

• After the feast she spent a week dieting to salve her conscience.大吃了一顿之后，她花了一周时间节食以安慰自己。
• You shouldn't have troubled yourself to prepare such a feast!你不该准备这样丰盛的饭菜，这样太麻烦你了！

9 cautioned   

v.警告，提醒，劝…小心( caution的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• He cautioned us for playing in that busy street. 他告诫我们不要在那条交通繁忙的路上玩。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• He cautioned that the Russia-American discussions were still in an exploratory stage. 他警告说俄美会谈尚处于探索阶段。 来自《简明英汉词典》

10 cramps   

n. 抽筋, 腹部绞痛, 铁箍 adj. 狭窄的, 难解的 v. 使...抽筋, 以铁箍扣紧, 束缚

参考例句：

• If he cramps again let the line cut him off. 要是它再抽筋，就让这钓索把它勒断吧。
• "I have no cramps." he said. “我没抽筋，"他说。