Intensive Reading

Paraphrase

Lesson 11

1. My father would bring the team down Fifth Avenue at a smart trot, flicking his whip over the horses' rumps and making the bells double their light, thin jangling over the snow, whose radiance threw back a brilliance like the sound of bells. (Para. 1)

My father caused the horses to move quickly down the road, hitting their hind part with a light, quick below. The bells rang lightly and quickly, but not necessarily harmoniously, over the snow, which in turn threw back a brightness that was like the sound of bells.

2. It always troubled me as a boy of eight that the horses had so indifferent a view of their late friend appearing as a warm overcoat on the back of the man who put the iron bit in their mouths. (Para. 2)

I was puzzled as a little boy over the horses' indifference towards their dead friend, whose hide had now turned into my father's overcoat. It was hard for me to understand why the horses did not know or care that the overcoat came from the hide of their friend. And the same man had also put a metal bar in their mouths to control them.

3. There would be an occasional brass-mounted automobile laboring on its narrow tires and as often as not pulled up the slippery hills by a horse, and we would pass it with a triumphant shout for an awkward nuisance which was obviously not here to stay. (Para. 3)

On our way, from time to time, we would come across a car moving slowly and carefully over the packed snow. It had difficulty climbing up hills, which were slippery with the snow, so it was often pulled up by a horse. The clumsy automobile was out of place and the high-ranking officials sitting inside it just wanted to slow off.

4. ... the body heat of many animals weighting a thousand pounds and more; pigs in one corner making their dark, brown-sounding grunts... (Para. 7)

The smell of quite a number of big and strong animals was very strong. At the same time, since the barn was filled with animals, it was also warm. Pigs were uttering deep, gloomy, and sonorous sounds...

5. It gave him a better appetite, he argued, than plain fresh air, which was thin and had no body to it. (Para. 7)

With so much content and life in it, the rich odor of the barn appealed to my father much better than mild fresh air, which, according to him, was weak and lacked substance.

6. ... and as my aunt hurried I could smell in her apron that freshest of all odors with which the human nose is honored--bread straight from the oven. (Para. 11)

My aunt had been baking some bread for the purpose of making the oven ready for the cooking of the meat. As she passed by, I could smell the most delightful of all smells--that of the freshly baked bread.

7. For days after such an ordeal they could not endure