the Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams
книга по английскому языку по теме

THE
Velveteen Rabbit

OR
HOW TOYS BECOME REAL

by Margery Williams

HERE was once a velveteen rabbit, he was really wonderful. He was fat, his coat was brown and white, he had real thread whiskers. On Christmas morning he was in the Boy's stocking. There were other things in the stocking, nuts and oranges and a toy engine, and chocolate and a clockwork mouse, but the Rabbit was the best of all. For two hours the Boy loved him. When his Aunts and Uncles came to dinner with the new presents the Velveteen Rabbit was forgotten.

For a long time he lived in the toy cupboard. He was shy. Some of the more expensive toys laughed at him. The mechanical toys were very better, they were real. Between them the poor little Rabbit was sad, and the only the Skin Horse was kind to him. He was old and wise.

"What is REAL?" asked the Rabbit one day. "Does it mean having buzz things inside you?"

"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."

"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit.

"Sometimes," said the Skin Horse.

"Does it happen all at once," he asked, "or bit by bit?"

"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time.

There was a person called Nana who cleaned the room.

One evening, when the Boy was going to bed, he couldn't find the dog Nana was in a hurry, and she took a toy in a cupboard.

"Here," she said, "take your old Bunny! He'll do to sleep with you!"

That night, and for many nights after, the Velveteen Rabbit slept in the Boy's bed. They played together a lot. the little Rabbit was very happy.

 In spring they had long days in the garden. Once, the Boy went home for tea, the Rabbit was alone. Nana came to look for him at night because the Boy couldn't go to sleep without the Bunny.

"Why are you so worried about a toy!" she said.

"Give me my Bunny!" he said. "You mustn't say that. He isn't a toy. He's REAL!"

When the little Rabbit heard that he was happy. 

That was a wonderful Summer!

Near the house there was a wood, the Boy liked to go there after tea to play. He took the Velveteen Rabbit with him, made the Rabbit a little comfortable nest. Suddenly the Bunny saw rabbits like himself. But they were newer. They watched him.

"Why don't you get up and play with us?" one of them asked.

"I can`t," said the Rabbit.

 "It's easy," And he jumped high.

"He hasn't got any legs to jump!" he called out. And he began to laugh.

"I have!" cried the little Rabbit.

Show me!" said the wild rabbit. And he began to dance

"I don't like dancing," he said.

The strange rabbit came so close

"He doesn't smell right!" he exclaimed. "He isn't a rabbit at all! He isn't real!"

"I am Real!" said the little Rabbit. "I am Real! The Boy said so!"

Suddenly the Boy took the Rabbit. 

Weeks passed, and the little Rabbit grew very old and shabby, but the Boy loved him just as much. But when you are Real it doesn't matter.

And then, one day, the Boy was ill. In several days he was ok. But all his toys must be burnt. And so the little Rabbit was put into a sack with rubbish, and carried out to the garden. The Boy had a new bunny to sleep with him. The Bunny was scared. He thought of those long sunlit hours in the garden–how happy they were. He was sad. He began to cry.

And then a strange thing happened. For where the tear had fallen a flower grew out of the ground. And a fairy appeared.

Her dress was of pearl and there were flowers round her neck and in her hair, and her face was like the most perfect flower of all. And she came close to the little Rabbit and kissed him on his velveteen nose.

"Little Rabbit," she said, "don't you know who I am?"

"I take care of all toys that the children have loved. When they are old and the children don't need them any more, then I come and take them away with me and turn them into Real."

"You were Real to the Boy," the Fairy said, "because he loved you. Now you will be Real to every one."

And she took the Rabbit into the wood. The forest was beautiful,

"Run and play, little Rabbit!" she said.

he saw all the wild rabbits dancing around him

Then he had brown fur, soft and shiny, He jumped happily

 the Fairy had gone.

He was a Real Rabbit at last, at home with the other rabbits.

In Spring, the Boy went out to play in the wood behind the house. The rabbits came to watch him.

"Why, he looks just like my old Bunny that was lost when I was ill!"

But he never knew that it really was his own Bunny, come back to look at the child who had first helped him to be Real.