← Their most faithful disciples were the two cart−horses, Boxer and Clover. These two had great difficulty in thinking anything out for themselves, but having once accepted the pigs as their teachers, they absorbed everything that they were told, and passed it on to the other animals by simple arguments. 🔊
← That was theirs too, but they were frightened to go inside. After a moment, however, Snowball and Napoleon butted the door open with their shoulders and the animals entered in single file, walking with the utmost care for fear of disturbing anything. 🔊
← As for the pigs, they could already read and write perfectly. The dogs learned to read fairly well, but were not interested in reading anything except the Seven Commandments. 🔊
← Napoleon took no interest in Snowball's committees. He said that the education of the young was more important than anything that could be done for those who were already grown up. 🔊
← A thought struck Clover. Without saying anything to the others, she went to Mollie's stall and turned over the straw with her hoof. 🔊
← These two disagreed at every point where disagreement was possible. If one of them suggested sowing a bigger acreage with barley, the other was certain to demand a bigger acreage of oats, and if one of them said that such and such a field was just right for cabbages, the other would declare that it was useless for anything except roots. 🔊
← The animals had never heard of anything of this kind before (for the farm was an old−fashioned one and had only the most primitive machinery), and they listened in astonishment while Snowball conjured up pictures of fantastic machines which would do their work for them while they grazed at their ease in the fields or improved their minds with reading and conversation. 🔊
← He set his ears back, shook his forelock several times, and tried hard to marshal his thoughts; but in the end he could not think of anything to say. 🔊
← In their spare moments the animals would walk round and round the half−finished mill, admiring the strength and perpendicularity of its walls and marvelling that they should ever have been able to build anything so imposing. 🔊
← Whenever anything went wrong it became usual to attribute it to Snowball. If a window was broken or a drain was blocked up, someone was certain to say that Snowball had come in the night and done it, and when the key of the store−shed was lost, the whole farm was convinced that Snowball had thrown it down the well. 🔊
← When they had finished their confession, the dogs promptly tore their throats out, and in a terrible voice Napoleon demanded whether any other animal had anything to confess. 🔊
← But the pigs seemed comfortable enough, and in fact were putting on weight if anything. 🔊
← Without saying anything, she tugged gently at his mane and led him round to the end of the big barn, where the Seven Commandments were written. 🔊