tion>
Kenneth Grahame
The Wind in the Willows
Published by Good Press, 2019
EAN 4057664146502
Table of Contents
THE PIPER AT THE GATES OF DAWN
THE FURTHER ADVENTURES OF TOAD
"LIKE SUMMER TEMPESTS CAME HIS TEARS"
ILLUSTRATIONS
| The Piper at the Gates of Dawn | Frontispiece |
| Facing Page | |
| It was the Water Rat | 8 |
| "Come on!" he said. "We shall just have to walk it" | 50 |
| In panic, he began to run | 64 |
| Through the Wild Wood and the snow | 94 |
| Toad was a helpless prisoner in the remotest dungeon | 164 |
| He lay prostrate in his misery on the floor | 196 |
| "It's a hard life, by all accounts," murmured the Rat | 240 |
| Dwelling chiefly on his own cleverness, and presence of mind in emergencies | 292 |
| The Badger said, "Now then, follow me!" | 326 |
I
THE RIVER BANK
THE Mole had been working very hard all the morning, spring-cleaning his little home. First with brooms, then with dusters; then on ladders and steps and chairs, with a brush and a pail of whitewash; till he had dust in his throat and eyes, and splashes of whitewash all over his black fur, and an aching back and weary arms. Spring was moving in the air above and in the earth below and around him, penetrating even his dark and lowly little house with its spirit of divine discontent and longing. It was small wonder, then, that he suddenly flung down his brush on the floor, said, "Bother!" and "O blow!" and also "Hang spring-cleaning!" and bolted out of the house without even waiting to put on his coat. Something up above was calling him imperiously, and he made for the steep little tunnel which answered in his case to the gravelled carriage-drive owned by animals whose residences are nearer to the sun and air. So he scraped and scratched and scrabbled and scrooged, and then he scrooged again and scrabbled and scratched and scraped, working busily with his little paws and muttering to himself, "Up we go! Up we go!" till at last, pop! his snout came out into the sunlight and he found himself rolling in the warm grass of a great meadow.
"This is fine!" he said to himself. "This is better than whitewashing!" The sunshine struck hot on his fur, soft breezes caressed his heated brow, and after the seclusion of the cellarage he had lived in so long the carol of happy birds fell on his dulled hearing almost like a shout. Jumping off all his four legs at once, in the joy of living and the delight of spring without its cleaning, he pursued his way across the meadow till he reached the hedge on the further side.
"Hold up!" said an elderly rabbit at the gap. "Sixpence for the privilege of passing by the