【正文】 pier than when Fern was warming up a bottle for him. He would stand and gaze up at her with adoring eyes.For the first few days of his life, Wilbur was allowed to live in a boxnear the stove in the kitchen. Then, when Mrs. Arable plained, he was moved to a bigger box in the woodshed. At two weeks of age, he was moved outdoors. It was appleblossom time, and the days were getting warmer. Mr. Arable fixed a small yard specially for Wilbur under an apple tree, and gave him a large wooden box full of straw, with a doorway cut in it so he could walk in and out as he pleased.Won39。t he be cold at night? asked Fern.No, said her father. You watch and see what he does.Carrying a bottle of milk, Fern sat down under the apple tree inside the yard. Wilbur ran to her and she held the bottle for him while hesucked. When he had finished the last drop, he grunted and walked sleepily into the box. Fern peered through the door. Wilbur was poking the straw with his snout. In a short time he had dug a tunnel in the straw. He crawled into the tunnel and disappeared from sight, pletely covered with straw.Fern was enchanted. It relieved her mind to know that her baby would sleep covered up, and would stay warm.Every morning after breakfast, Wilbur walked out to the road with Fern and waited with her till the bus came. She would wave goodbye to him, and he would stand and watch the bus until it vanished around a turn. While Fern was in school, Wilbur was shut up inside his yard. But as soon as she got home in the afternoon, she would take him out and he would follow her around the place. If she went into the house, Wilbur went, too. If she went upstairs, Wilbur would wait at the bottom step until she came down again. If she took her doll for a walk in the doll carriage, Wilbur followed along. Sometimes, on these journeys, Wilbur would get tired, and Fern would pick him up and put him in the carriage alongside the doll. He liked this. And if he was very tired, he would close his eyes and go to sleep under the doll39。s blanket. He looked cute when his eyes were closed, because his lashes were so long. The doll would close her eyes, too, and Fern would wheel the carriage very slowly and smoothly so as not to wake her infants.One warm afternoon, Fern and Avery put on bathing suits and went down to the brook for a swim. Wilbur tagged along at Fern39。s heels. When she waded into the brook, Wilbur waded in with her. He found the water quite cold too cold for his liking. So while the children swam and played and splashed water at each other, Wilbur amused himself in the mud along the edge of the brook, where it was warm and moist and delightfully sticky and oozy.Every day was a happy day, and every night was peaceful.Wilbur was what farmers call a spring pig, which simply means that he was born in springtime. When he was five weeks old, Mr. Arable said he was now big enough to sell, and would have to be sold. Fern broke down and wept. But her father was firm about it. Wilbur39。s appetite had increased。 he was beginning to eat scraps of food in addition to milk. Mr. Arable was not willing to provide 瞻養(yǎng) for him any longer. He had already sold Wilbur39。s ten brothers and sisters.He39。s got to go, Fern, he said. You have had your fun raising a baby pig, but Wilbur is not a baby any longer and he has got to be sold.Call up the Zuckermans, suggested Mrs. Arable to Fern. Your Uncle Homer sometimes raises a pig. And if Wilbur goes there to live, you can walk down the road and visit him as often as you like.How much money should I ask for him? Fern wanted to know.Well, said her father, he39。s a runt. Tell your Uncle Homer you39。ve got a pig you39。ll sell for six dollars, and see what he says.It was soon arranged. Fern phoned and got her Aunt Edith, and her Aunt Edith hollered for Uncle Homer, and Uncle Homer came in from the barn and talked to Fern. When he heard that the price was only six dollars, he said he would buy the pig. Next day Wilbur was taken from his home under the apple tree and went to live in a manure pile in the cellar of Zuckerman39。s barn.CHAPTER 3EscapeThe barn was very large. It was very old. It smelled of hay and itsmelled of manure. It smelled of the perspiration of tired horses and the wonderful sweet breath of patient cows. It often had a sort of peaceful smell as though nothing bad could happen ever again in the world. It smelled of grain and of harness dressing and of axle grease and of rubber boots and of new rope. And whenever the cat was given a fishhead to eat, the barn would smell of fish. But mostly it smelled of hay, for there was always hay in the great loft up overhead. And there was always hay being pitched down to the cows and the horses and the sheep.The barn was pleasantly warm in winter when the animals spent most of their time indoors, and it was pleasantly cool in summer when the big doors stood wide open to the breeze. The barn had stalls on the main floor for the work horses, tieups〔美sl.〕拴系牲畜的地方 on the main floor for the cows, a sheepfold 羊欄 down below for the sheep, a pigpen down below for Wilbur, and it was full of all sorts of things that you find in barns: ladders, grindstones, pitch forks, monkey wrenches, scythes 長(zhǎng)柄的大鐮刀, lawn mowers, snow shovels, ax handles, milk pails, water buckets, empty grain sacks, and rusty rat traps. It was the kind of barn that swallows like to build their nests in. It was the kind of barn that children like to play in. And the whole thing was owned by Fern39。s uncle, Mr. Homer L. Zuckerman.Wilbur39。s new home was in the lower part of the barn, directly underneath the cows. Mr. Zuckerman knew that a manure pile is a good place to keep a young pig. Pigs need warmth, and it was warm and fortable down there in the barn cellar on the south side.Fern came almost every day to visit him. She found an old milking stool that had been discarded, and she pl