本书摘录:
Preface
_ PREFACE
The late Mr Waterton having, some time ago, expressed his opinion
that ravens are gradually becoming extinct in England, I offered
the few following words about my experience of these birds.
The raven in this story is a compound of two great originals, of
whom I was, at different times, the proud possessor. The first was
in the bloom of his youth, when he was discovered in a modest
retirement in London, by a friend of mine, and given to me. He had
from the first, as Sir Hugh Evans says of Anne Page, ‘good gifts‘,
which he improved by study and attention in a most exemplary
manner. He slept in a stable--generally on horseback--and so
terrified a Newfoundland dog by his preternatural sagacity, that he
has been known, by the mere superiority of his genius, to walk off
unmolested with the dog‘s dinner, from before his face. He was
rapidly rising in acquirements and virtues, when, in an evil hour,
his stable was newly painted. He o
......
全部内容,请购买此书。