The Kangaroo　袋鼠

“Well,”said little Herbert Joyce,as he looked over the books of drawings which his cousin had just brought home from Australia,“I never saw anything so extraordinary before in all my life;why here is an animal with three heads,and two of them are very low down,and much smaller than the others.”“What do you mean,Herbert？”asked his cousin,who just then came into the room.“There are no three-headed animals—let me see the picture.Oh!no wonder you were puzzled;it does look like a queer creature.That is a kangaroo,and the small heads belong to her children,whom she carries about in a bag formed by a hole in her skin,until they are old enough to walk;and the little things seem very happy there;and sometimes,as their mother moves along over the grass,you may see them nibbling it.”

小赫伯特·乔伊斯正在翻看他表哥新近从澳大利亚带回家的画册。“哇，我可从来没见过这么奇异的事情。瞧，这个动物有三个脑袋，两个在下面，而且，这两个脑袋比上面的那个小这么多。”这时，刚好表哥进来，听到他的话，就问：“说什么呢，赫伯特？没有三个脑袋的动物——让我看看。哦！怪不得你觉得奇怪呢，看上去的确很奇怪。这是袋鼠，下面的两个脑袋是两只小袋鼠的。袋鼠妈妈的身上有一个洞，这个洞就是装小袋鼠的袋子。袋鼠妈妈兜着小袋鼠进进出出，直到小袋鼠能走路为止；小家伙们似乎很高兴待在袋子里。有时候，袋鼠妈妈在草地上活动，它们还顺便探出脑袋啃草吃呢。”