← The stupidest questions of all were asked by Mollie, the white mare. The very first question she asked Snowball was: "Will there still be sugar after the Rebellion? " 🔊
← At last they could stand it no longer. One of the cows broke in the door of the store−shed with her horn and all the animals began to help themselves from the bins. 🔊
← They were just coming down the stairs when Mollie was discovered to be missing. Going back, the others found that she had remained behind in the best bedroom. 🔊
← Nobody shirked−or almost nobody. Mollie, it was true, was not good at getting up in the mornings, and had a way of leaving work early on the ground that there was a stone in her hoof. 🔊
← She was seen one day sitting on a roof and talking to some sparrows who were just out of her reach. 🔊
← She was telling them that all animals were now comrades and that any sparrow who chose could come and perch on her paw; but the sparrows kept their distance. 🔊
← She had taken to flight as soon as the gun went off. And when the others came back from looking for her, it was to find that the stable−lad, who in fact was only stunned, had already recovered and made off. 🔊
← "It isn't true!" repeated Mollie, but she could not look Clover in the face, and the next moment she took to her heels and galloped away into the field. 🔊
← As Clover looked down the hillside her eyes filled with tears. If she could have spoken her thoughts, it would have been to say that this was not what they had aimed at when they had set themselves years ago to work for the overthrow of the human race. 🔊
← There was no thought of rebellion or disobedience in her mind. She knew that, even as things were, they were far better off than they had been in the days of Jones, and that before all else it was needful to prevent the return of the human beings. 🔊
← Whatever happened she would remain faithful, work hard, carry out the orders that were given to her, and accept the leadership of Napoleon. 🔊
← But still, it was not for this that she and all the other animals had hoped and toiled. 🔊
← At last, feeling this to be in some way a substitute for the words she was unable to find, she began to sing Beasts of England. 🔊
← The other animals sitting round her took it up, and they sang it three times over−very tunefully, but slowly and mournfully, in a way they had never sung it before. 🔊
← "A horse's lungs do not last for ever," she said to him. But Boxer would not listen. 🔊
← In the evenings she lay in his stall and talked to him, while Benjamin kept the flies off him. 🔊
← All the animals followed, crying out at the tops of their voices. Clover forced her way to the front. 🔊
← "Boxer!" she cried. "Boxer! Boxer! Boxer!" And just at this moment, as though he had heard the uproar outside, Boxer's face, with the white stripe down his nose, appeared at the small window at the back of the van. 🔊
← Startled, the animals stopped in their tracks. It was Clover's voice. She neighed again, and all the animals broke into a gallop and rushed into the yard. 🔊
← For once Benjamin consented to break his rule, and he read out to her what was written on the wall. 🔊