Kitabı oku: «The Story of Doctor Dolittle / История Доктора Дулиттла. Уровень 1», sayfa 3

“I knew that parrots can talk,” said the Doctor.

“Oh, we parrots can talk in two languages—people’s language and bird-language,” said Polynesia proudly. “If I say, ‘Polly wants a snack,’ you understand me. But hear this: Ka-ka oi-ee, fee-fee?”

“What does that mean?” asked the Doctor.

“That means, ‘Is the porridge hot yet?’—in bird-language.”

“My! You don’t say so!” said the Doctor. “You never talked that way to me before.”

“I never did.” said Polynesia, shaking some crumbs off her left wing. “Because I knew you wouldn’t understand me.”

“Tell me some more,” said the Doctor, all excited. Then he rushed over to the drawer and got himself a book and a pencil. “Now don’t go too fast—and I’ll write it down. This is something quite new! Give me the letters A, B and C in the Birds’ first—slowly now.”

So that was the way the Doctor learned that animals had a language of their own and could talk to one another. And all that afternoon, while it was raining, Polynesia sat on the kitchen table and gave him bird words. The Doctor carefully put them down in the book.

At tea-time, when the dog, Jip, came in, the parrot said to the Doctor, “See, he’s talking to you.”

“Looks to me as though he were scratching his ear,” said the Doctor.

“But animals don’t always speak with their mouths,” said the parrot and raised her eyebrows. “They talk with their ears, with their feet, with their tails—with everything. Sometimes they don’t want to make a noise. Do you see now the way he’s moving his nose to a side?”

“What does that mean?” asked the Doctor.

“He is asking you, ‘Is it still raining?’” Polynesia answered. “Dogs nearly always use their noses for asking questions.”

After a while, with the parrot’s help, the Doctor learned the language of the animals. Now he could talk to them himself and understand everything they said. Then he gave up being a people’s doctor altogether.

Soon the meat seller told everyone that John Dolittle became an animal-doctor. Old ladies began to bring him their pet dogs who ate too much cake; and farmers came many miles to show him sick cows and sheep.

One day someone brought a horse to him. The poor thing was terribly glad to find a man who could talk in horse-language.

“You know, Doctor,” said the horse, “that vet over the hill knows nothing at all. I tried to tell him I am going blind in one eye. But he couldn’t understand a word of horse-language. What I need is glasses. There’s no reason why horses shouldn’t wear glasses, the same as people.”

“Of course—of course,” said the Doctor. “I’ll get you some at once.”

“I would like a pair like yours,” said the horse, “only green. They’ll keep the sun out of my eyes while I’m working in the field.”

“Okay,” said the Doctor. “I’ll get you green ones.”