Name: The Wonderful Adventures of Nils by Selma Lagerlöf - 01 - The Boy
Uploaded: 2013-12-12T13:00:54.000Z
Duration: 41 min 33 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

Sunday, March twentieth. Once there was a boy.

He was--let us say--something like fourteen years old; long and loose-jointed and

He wasn't good for much, that boy. His chief delight was to eat and sleep; and

after that--he liked best to make mischief. It was a Sunday morning and the boy's

parents were getting ready to go to church.

The boy sat on the edge of the table, in his shirt sleeves, and thought how lucky it

was that both father and mother were going away, and the coast would be clear for a

"Good! Now I can take down pop's gun and fire off a shot, without anybody's meddling

But it was almost as if father should have guessed the boy's thoughts, for just as he

was on the threshold--ready to start--he stopped short, and turned toward the boy.

"Since you won't come to church with mother and me," he said, "the least you can do, is

to read the service at home. Will you promise to do so?"

"Yes," said the boy, "that I can do easy enough."

And he thought, of course, that he wouldn't read any more than he felt like reading.

The boy thought that never had he seen his mother so persistent.

In a second she was over by the shelf near the fireplace, and took down Luther's

Commentary and laid it on the table, in front of the window--opened at the service

She also opened the New Testament, and placed it beside the Commentary.

Finally, she drew up the big arm-chair, which was bought at the parish auction the

year before, and which, as a rule, no one but father was permitted to occupy.

The boy sat thinking that his mother was giving herself altogether too much trouble

with this spread; for he had no intention of reading more than a page or so.

But now, for the second time, it was almost as if his father were able to see right

He walked up to the boy, and said in a severe tone: "Now, remember, that you are

For when we come back, I shall question you thoroughly; and if you have skipped a

single page, it will not go well with you."

"The service is fourteen and a half pages long," said his mother, just as if she

wanted to heap up the measure of his misfortune.

"You'll have to sit down and begin the reading at once, if you expect to get

through with it." With that they departed.

And as the boy stood in the doorway watching them, he thought that he had been

"There they go congratulating themselves, I suppose, in the belief that they've hit

upon something so good that I'll be forced to sit and hang over the sermon the whole

But his father and mother were certainly not congratulating themselves upon anything

of the sort; but, on the contrary, they were very much distressed.

They were poor farmers, and their place was not much bigger than a garden-plot.

When they first moved there, the place couldn't feed more than one pig and a pair

of chickens; but they were uncommonly industrious and capable folk--and now they

Things had turned out very well for them; and they would have gone to church that

beautiful morning--satisfied and happy--if they hadn't had their son to think of.

Father complained that he was dull and lazy; he had not cared to learn anything at

school, and he was such an all-round good- for-nothing, that he could barely be made

Mother did not deny that this was true; but she was most distressed because he was wild

and bad; cruel to animals, and ill-willed toward human beings.

"May God soften his hard heart, and give him a better disposition!" said the mother,

"or else he will be a misfortune, both to himself and to us."

The boy stood for a long time and pondered whether he should read the service or not.

Finally, he came to the conclusion that, this time, it was best to be obedient.

He seated himself in the easy chair, and began to read.

But when he had been rattling away in an undertone for a little while, this mumbling

seemed to have a soothing effect upon him-- and he began to nod.

It was the most beautiful weather outside!

It was only the twentieth of March; but the boy lived in West Vemminghög Township, down

in Southern Skane, where the spring was already in full swing.

It was not as yet green, but it was fresh and budding.

There was water in all the trenches, and the colt's-foot on the edge of the ditch

All the weeds that grew in among the stones were brown and shiny.

The beech-woods in the distance seemed to swell and grow thicker with every second.

The cottage door stood ajar, and the lark's trill could be heard in the room.

The hens and geese pattered about in the yard, and the cows, who felt the spring air

away in their stalls, lowed their approval every now and then.

The boy read and nodded and fought against drowsiness.

"No! I don't want to fall asleep," thought he, "for then I'll not get through with

But--somehow--he fell asleep. He did not know whether he had slept a

short while, or a long while; but he was awakened by hearing a slight noise back of

On the window-sill, facing the boy, stood a small looking-glass; and almost the entire

As the boy raised his head, he happened to look in the glass; and then he saw that the

cover to his mother's chest had been opened.

His mother owned a great, heavy, iron-bound oak chest, which she permitted no one but

Here she treasured all the things she had inherited from her mother, and of these she

Here lay a couple of old-time peasant dresses, of red homespun cloth, with short

bodice and plaited shirt, and a pearl- bedecked breast pin.

There were starched white-linen head- dresses, and heavy silver ornaments and

Folks don't care to go about dressed like that in these days, and several times his

mother had thought of getting rid of the old things; but somehow, she hadn't had the

Now the boy saw distinctly--in the glass-- that the chest-lid was open.

He could not understand how this had happened, for his mother had closed the

She never would have left that precious chest open when he was at home, alone.

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The Wonderful Adventures of Nils by Selma Lagerlöf - 01 - The Boy

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