英文短故事：The Crane and The Snake

In a forest close to the river bank mere¹ lived a crane with his wife. They were very unhappy. Every time the wife laid eggs in their nest, a big black cobra who lived in a hollow in the tree, would eat them up. The crane had a friend the crab². He went to his friend the crab and shared his misery³. "I feel so hopeless….That sneaking⁴ thief has eaten our eggs again," complained the crane angrily. 

 

“Don’t worry," said the crab comfortingly. “You need not be hopeless when you have a friend like me. We will come up with a solution." 

 

The crab sat to think of a plan. Suddenly he jumped up and rushed to the crane. 

 

“Friend, I have a wonderful plan," said the crab and whispered something into the crane’s car. 

 

The crane flew back to his nest and told his wife all about the crab’s plan. He was very excited. 

 

“Are you sure this will work?" asked the wife. 

 

“I hope we are not making a mistake. Think twice before going ahead with the plan." 

 

But the crane was eager to try out the plan. The crane flew down to the river bank and began to fish. He caught several little fishes and went down to the hole in which a mongoose lived. He dropped a fish at the mouth of the hole. Then he took another fish and dropped it a little further away from the first one. Repeating this, he made a trail of fishes leading to the tree where his nest was. 

 

The mongoose smelt⁵ the fish and came out of the hole. “Ah, a fish!" exclaimed the mongoose joyfully⁶ and quickly ate it up. He then followed the trail of fishes. As he neared the tree where the cranes and the snake lived, the trail ended. Finding no more fishes, he looked around. 

 

Suddenly he came across the black cobra at the foot of the tree. Seeing the mongoose, the cobra fought for his life. Both fought for a long time and in the end the mongoose killed the snake. The cranes who were watching the fight from their nest sighed with relief. 

 

The next day the mongoose began to follow the same trail hoping to find more food. When he came to the tree where the trail ended, he decided⁷ to climb the tree in search of food. 

 

The cranes who were away at the river bank returned to find the mongoose climbing down the tree. On looking in their nest, they discovered that this time, the mongoose had eaten up all their eggs. 

 

“Alas! We got rid of one enemy only to find another," said the crane to his wife.  

1 mere   

adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过

参考例句：

• That is a mere repetition of what you said before.那不过是重复了你以前讲的话。
• It's a mere waste of time waiting any longer.再等下去纯粹是浪费时间。

2 crab   

n.螃蟹，偏航，脾气乖戾的人，酸苹果；vi.捕蟹，偏航，发牢骚；vt.使偏航，发脾气

参考例句：

• I can't remember when I last had crab.我不记得上次吃蟹是什么时候了。
• The skin on my face felt as hard as a crab's back.我脸上的皮仿佛僵硬了，就象螃蟹的壳似的。

3 misery   

n.痛苦，苦恼，苦难；悲惨的境遇，贫苦

参考例句：

• Business depression usually causes misery among the working class.商业不景气常使工薪阶层受苦。
• He has rescued me from the mire of misery.他把我从苦海里救了出来。

4 sneaking   

a.秘密的，不公开的

参考例句：

• She had always had a sneaking affection for him. 以前她一直暗暗倾心于他。
• She ducked the interviewers by sneaking out the back door. 她从后门偷偷溜走，躲开采访者。

5 smelt   

v.熔解，熔炼；n.银白鱼，胡瓜鱼

参考例句：

• Tin is a comparatively easy metal to smelt.锡是比较容易熔化的金属。
• Darby was looking for a way to improve iron when he hit upon the idea of smelting it with coke instead of charcoal.达比一直在寻找改善铁质的方法，他猛然想到可以不用木炭熔炼，而改用焦炭。

6 joyfully   

adv. 喜悦地, 高兴地

参考例句：

• She tripped along joyfully as if treading on air. 她高兴地走着，脚底下轻飘飘的。
• During these first weeks she slaved joyfully. 在最初的几周里，她干得很高兴。

7 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。