The Swiss Family Robinson: A Translation from the Original GermanWyss, Johann David
General
The Swiss Family Robinson: A Translation from the Original German
Wyss, Johann David
Family life -- Fiction; Islands -- Fiction; Survival -- Fiction
"Yes," said Ernest, "it is a penguin, I think; it let me get quite
close, so that I knocked it on the head with a stick. Here are its head
and feet, which I preserved to show you; the bill is, you see, narrow
and curved downward, and the feet are webbed. It had funny little bits
of useless wings, and its eyes looked so solemnly and sedately at me
that I was almost ashamed to kill it. Do you not think it must have been
a penguin?"
"I have little doubt on the matter, my boy," and I was about to make a
few remarks on the habits of this bird, when my wife interrupted me and
begged us to come to dinner, and continue our natural history
conversation at some future time. We then sat down before the appetizing
meal prepared for us, our gourds coming for the first time into use, and
having done it full justice, produced the cocoanuts by way of dessert.
"Here is better food for your little friend," said I to Fritz, who had
been vainly endeavoring to persuade the monkey to taste dainty morsels
of the food we had been eating; "the poor little animal has been
accustomed to nothing but its mother's milk; fetch me a saw, one of
you."
I then, after extracting the milk of the nuts from their natural holes,
carefully cut the shells in half, thus providing several more useful
basins. The monkey was perfectly satisfied with the milk, and eagerly
sucked the corner of a handkerchief dipped in it. Fritz now suddenly
recollected his delicious wine, and producing his flask, begged his
mother to taste it. "Try it first yourself," said I; Fritz did so, and I
instantly saw by his countenance that the liquor had passed through the
first stage of fermentation and had become vinegar.
"Never mind, my boy," said my prudent wife, when she learned the cause
of his wry faces, "we have wine already; but no vinegar; I am really
pleased at the transformation."
The sun was now rapidly sinking behind the horizon, and the poultry,
retiring for the night, warned us that we must follow their example.
Having offered up our prayers, we lay down on our beds, the monkey
crouched down between Jack and Fritz, and we were all soon fast asleep.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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