“Comrades, you have heard already about the strange dream that I had last night. When Major saw that they had all made themselves comfortable and were waiting attentively, he cleared his throat and began: Last of all came the cat, who looked round, as usual, for the warmest place, and finally squeezed herself in between Boxer and Clover there she purred contentedly throughout Major’s speech without listening to a word of what he was saying.Īll the animals were now present except Moses, the tame raven, who slept on a perch behind the back door. She took a place near the front and began flirting her white mane, hoping to draw attention to the red ribbons it was plaited with. Jones’s trap, came mincing daintily in, chewing at a lump of sugar. At the last moment Mollie, the foolish, pretty white mare who drew Mr. Clover made a sort of wall round them with her great foreleg, and the ducklings nestled down inside it and promptly fell asleep. The two horses had just lain down when a brood of ducklings, which had lost their mother, filed into the barn, cheeping feebly and wandering from side to side to find some place where they would not be trodden on.
Nevertheless, without openly admitting it, he was devoted to Boxer the two of them usually spent their Sundays together in the small paddock beyond the orchard, grazing side by side and never speaking. If asked why, he would say that he saw nothing to laugh at. Alone among the animals on the farm he never laughed. He seldom talked, and when he did, it was usually to make some cynical remark – for instance, he would say that God had given him a tail to keep the flies off, but that he would sooner have had no tail and no flies. Benjamin was the oldest animal on the farm, and the worst tempered. After the horses came Muriel, the white goat, and Benjamin, the donkey.
A white stripe down his nose gave him a somewhat stupid appearance, and in fact he was not of first-rate intelligence, but he was universally respected for his steadiness of character and tremendous powers of work. Boxer was an enormous beast, nearly eighteen hands high, and as strong as any two ordinary horses put together. Clover was a stout motherly mare approaching middle life, who had never quite got her figure back after her fourth foal. The two cart-horses, Boxer and Clover, came in together, walking very slowly and setting down their vast hairy hoofs with great care lest there should be some small animal concealed in the straw. The hens perched themselves on the window-sills, the pigeons fluttered up to the rafters, the sheep and cows lay down behind the pigs and began to chew the cud. First came the three dogs, Bluebell, Jessie, and Pincher, and then the pigs, who settled down in the straw immediately in front of the platform.
Before long the other animals began to arrive and make themselves comfortable after their different fashions. He was twelve years old and had lately grown rather stout, but he was still a majestic-looking pig, with a wise and benevolent appearance in spite of the fact that his tushes had never been cut. Old Major (so he was always called, though the name under which he had been exhibited was Willingdon Beauty) was so highly regarded on the farm that everyone was quite ready to lose an hour’s sleep in order to hear what he had to say.Īt one end of the big barn, on a sort of raised platform, Major was already ensconced on his bed of straw, under a lantern which hung from a beam. It had been agreed that they should all meet in the big barn as soon as Mr. Word had gone round during the day that old Major, the prize Middle White boar, had had a strange dream on the previous night and wished to communicate it to the other animals. Jones was already snoring.Īs soon as the light in the bedroom went out there was a stirring and a fluttering all through the farm buildings. With the ring of light from his lantern dancing from side to side, he lurched across the yard, kicked off his boots at the back door, drew himself a last glass of beer from the barrel in the scullery, and made his way up to bed, where Mrs. Jones, of the Manor Farm, had locked the hen-houses for the night, but was too drunk to remember to shut the pop-holes.
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