高中阅读教程IIB Lesson 16

Lesson 16
The Giant Lumberjack
巨人伐木工
Anonymous
Many years ago, Paul Bunyan was born in the northeastern American state of Maine. His mother and father were shocked when they first saw the boy. Paul was so large at birth that five large birds had to carry him to his parents. When the boy was only a few weeks old, he weighed more than forty-five kilograms. As a child, Paul was always hungry. His parents needed ten cows to supply milk for his meals. Before long, he ate fifty eggs, and ten baskets of potatoes every day. 
Young Paul grew so big that his parents did not know what to do with him. Once Paul rolled over so much in his sleep that he caused an earthquake. This angered people in the town where his parents lived. So the government told his father and mother they would have to move him somewhere else. Paul’s father built a wooden cradle（摇篮）, a traditional bed for a baby. His parents put the cradle in waters along the coast of Maine. However, every time Paul rolled over, huge waves covered all the coastal（海岸的）towns, so his parents brought their son back on land. They took him in the woods. This is where he grew up. 
As a boy Paul helped his father cut down trees. Paul had the strength of many men. He also was extremely fast. He could turn off a light and then jumped into his bed before the room got dark. 
Maine is very cold for much of the year. One day, it started to snow. The snow covered Paul’s home and a nearby forest. However, this snow was very unusual. It was blue. The blue snow kept falling until the forest was covered. Paul put on his snowshoes （雪鞋）and went out to see the unusual sight. As he walked, Paul discovered an animal stuck in the snow. It was a baby ox. Paul decided to take the ox with him. He put the animal near the fireplace. After the ox got warmer, his hair remained blue. 
Paul decided to keep the blue ox and named him Babe. Babe grew very quickly. One night, Paul left him in a small building with the other animals. The next morning, the barn was gone and so was Babe. Paul searched everywhere for the animal. He found Babe calmly eating grass in a valley with the barn still on top of his back. Babe followed Paul and grew every day. Every time Paul looked, Babe seemed to grow taller. 
In those days, much of North America was filled with thick green forests. Paul Bunyan could clear a large wooded（树木繁茂的）area with a single stroke of his large sharp axe（斧子）. Paul taught Babe to help with his work. Babe was very useful. For example, Paul had trouble removing trees along a road that was not straight. He decided to tie one end of the road to what remained of a tree in the ground. Paul tied the other end to Babe. Babe dug his feet in the ground and pulled with all his strength until the road became straight. 
In time Paul and Babe the blue ox left Maine and moved west to look for work in other forests. Along the way, Paul dug out the Great Lakes（五大湖）to provide drinking water for Babe. They settled in a camp near the Onion River in the state of Minnesota.
Paul’s camp was the largest in the country. The camp was so large that a man had to have one week’s supply of food when walking from one side of the camp to the other. 
Paul decided to get other lumberjacks（伐木工）to help with the work. His work crew（队）became known as the seven axe-men. Each man was more than two meters tall and weighed more than one hundred sixty kilograms. All of the axe men were named Elmer. That way, they always came running whenever Paul called them. The man who cooked for the group was named Sourdough（酵母）Sam. He made everything, except coffee, from sourdough, a substance（物质）used in making sourdough bread. Every Sunday, Paul and his crew ate hot cakes. Each hot cake was so large that it took five men to eat one. Paul usually ate ten or more hot cakes depending on how hungry he was. The table where the men ate was so long that a server（服务人员）usually drove to one end of the table and stayed the night. The server drove back in the morning with a fresh load（一车）of food.
Paul needed someone to help with the camp’s finances（资产）. He gave the job to a man named Johnny Inkslinger Johnny kept records of everything, including wages（工资）and the cost of feeding Babe. He sometimes used nine bottles of writing fluid（液体）a day to keep such detailed（详细的）records.
The camp also was home to Sport, the Reversible（可逆的）Dog. One of the workers accidentally（意外地）cut Sport in two. The man hurried to put the dog back together, but made a mistake. He bent the animal’s back the wrong way. However, that was not a problem for Sport. He learned to run on his front legs until he was tired. Then he turned the other way and ran on his back legs. 
Big mosquitoes（蚊子）were a problem at the camp. The men attacked the insects with their axes and long sticks. Before long, the men put barriers（屏障）around their living space. Then Paul ordered them to get big bees to destroy the mosquitoes. But the bees married the mosquitoes and the problem got worse. They began to produce young insects. One day, the insects’ love of sweets caused them to attack a ship that was bringing sugar to the camp. At last the mosquitoes and bees were defeated. They ate so much sugar they could not move. 
Paul always gave Babe the blue ox a thirty-five-kilogram piece of sugar when he was good, but sometimes Babe liked to play tricks. At night, Babe would make noises and hit the ground with his feet. The man at the camp would run out of the buildings where they slept thinking it was an earthquake.
When winter came Babe had trouble finding enough food to eat. Snow covered everything. Only the blacksmith（铁匠）solved（解决）the problem. He made huge green sunglasses for Babe. When Babe wore the sunglasses, he thought the snow was grass. Before long it was strong and healthy again. 
One year Paul’s camp was especially cold. It was so cold that the men let their facial（面部的）hair grow very long. When the men spoke, their words froze in the air. Everything they said remained frozen all winter long and did not melt until spring.Paul Bunyan and Babe left their mark on many areas. Some people say they were responsible for creating puge song in the west state of Washington. Others say Paul Bunyan and Babe cleared the trees from the state of North Dakota to South Dakota. They prepared this area for farming. 
Babe the blue ox died in South Dakota. One story says he ate too many hot cakes. Paul buried his old friend there. Today, the burial（埋葬）place is known as the Black Hills. Whatever happened to Paul Bunyan, there are lots of stories. Some people say he was last seen in Alaska, or even the Arctic（北极）Circle. Another tradition（传说）says he still returns to Minnesota every summer. It says Paul moves in and out of the woods, so few people ever know that he is there. 
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