pproached.

后来，所有五个笼子都被母鸡占据，三只棕色的，灰色黑色各有一只。五只母鸡紧紧伏在蛋上，温情款款，动作笨拙，羽毛抖动，彰显着雌性的本能。康妮在笼前蹲下来，母鸡明亮的眼睛圆睁着，喉咙里发出短促而尖利的咯咯声，愤怒地警告她不要靠近，但主要是出于雌性被接近时露出愤怒的本能。

Connie found corn in the corn-bin in the hut. She offered it to the hens in her hand. They would not eat it. Only one hen pecked at her hand with a fierce little jab, so Connie was frightened. But she was pining to give them something, the brooding mothers who neither fed themselves nor drank. She brought water in a little tin, and was delighted when one of the hens drank.

在小屋的粮仓里，康妮找来谷粒。她捧在手里，去喂母鸡。它们理都不理。只有其中一只向她的手猛啄过去，吓了康妮一跳。但她还是想方设法地喂它们，这些一心只想着孵蛋的母亲们却不吃也不喝。她端来一小罐水，其中一只喝了一口，这让她开心不已。

Now she came every day to the hens, they were the only things in the world that warmed her heart. Clifford's protestations made her go cold from head to foot. Mrs. Bolton's voice made her go cold, and the sound of the business men who came. An occasional letter from Michaelis affected her with the same sense of chill. She felt she would surely die if it lasted much longer.

现在，她每天都来看母鸡，它们成为世间唯一能温暖她心房的生灵。克利福德的信誓旦旦让她全身凉透。博尔顿太太的温言软语，到访实业家们的高谈阔论，都无法让她感到丝毫暖意。米凯利斯偶尔的飞鸿同样让她冷彻心扉。她觉得如果再这样继续下去，自己只有死路一条。

Yet it was spring, and the bluebells were coming in the wood, and the leaf-buds on the hazels were opening like the spatter of green rain. How terrible it was that it should be spring, and everything cold-hearted, cold-hearted. Only the hens, fluffed so wonderfully on the eggs, were warm with their hot, brooding female bodies! Connie felt herself living on the brink of fainting all the time.

但毕竟已经春回大地，风铃草再现树林，榛树萌发出的嫩叶就像是漫天飘舞的碧绿雨滴。春色烂漫，但万事万物却依旧冷酷，依然无情，这实在糟糕透顶。只有那些孵蛋的母鸡，优雅地在蛋上展开自己的羽毛，它们热切的雌性身躯，才能令人感到一丝暖意。康妮觉得自己随时随地都可能昏厥过去。

Then, one day, a lovely sunny day with great tufts of primroses under the hazels, and many violets dotting the paths, she came in the afternoon to the coops and there was one tiny, tiny perky chicken tinily prancing round in front of a coop, and the mother hen clucking in terror. The slim little chick was greyish brown with dark ma