← After the horses came Muriel, the white goat, and Benjamin, the donkey. Benjamin was the oldest animal on the farm, and the worst tempered. 🔊
← Muriel, the goat, could read somewhat better than the dogs, and sometimes used to read to the others in the evenings from scraps of newspaper which she found on the rubbish heap. 🔊
← Snowball now launched his second line of attack. Muriel, Benjamin, and all the sheep, with Snowball at the head of them, rushed forward and prodded and butted the men from every side, while Benjamin turned around and lashed at them with his small hoofs. 🔊
← Transporting the stone when it was once broken was comparatively simple. The horses carried it off in cart−loads, the sheep dragged single blocks, even Muriel and Benjamin yoked themselves into an old governess−cart and did their share. 🔊
← Finding herself unable to read more than individual letters, she fetched Muriel. "Muriel," she said, "read me the Fourth Commandment. 🔊
← Does it not say something about never sleeping in a bed?" With some difficulty Muriel spelt it out. 🔊
← They had made their way on to the little knoll where the half−finished windmill stood, and with one accord they all lay down as though huddling together for warmth−Clover, Muriel, Benjamin, the cows, the sheep, and a whole flock of geese and hens−everyone, indeed, except the cat, who had suddenly disappeared just before Napoleon ordered the animals to assemble. 🔊
← cried Muriel. "It's no longer needed, comrade," said Squealer stiffly. "Beasts of England was the song of the Rebellion. 🔊
← Clover asked Benjamin to read her the Sixth Commandment, and when Benjamin, as usual, said that he refused to meddle in such matters, she fetched Muriel. 🔊
← Muriel read the Commandment for her. It ran: "No animal shall kill any other animal without cause." 🔊
← But a few days later Muriel, reading over the Seven Commandments to herself, noticed that there was yet another of them which the animals had remembered wrong. 🔊
← Muriel began to spell out the words. But Benjamin pushed her aside and in the midst of a deadly silence he read: " 'Alfred Simmonds, Horse Slaughterer and Glue Boiler, Willingdon. 🔊
← Muriel was dead; Bluebell, Jessie, and Pincher were dead. Jones too was dead−he had died in an inebriates' home in another part of the country. 🔊