《瓦尔登湖·第十五章·冬天的禽兽·Winter Animals》第5节
At length the jays arrive, whose discordant screams were heard long before, as they were warily making their approach an eighth of a mile off, and in a stealthy and sneaking manner they flit from tree to tree, nearer and nearer, and pick up the kernels which the squirrels have dropped. Then, sitting on a pitch-pine bough, they attempt to swallow in their haste a kernel which is too big for their throats and chokes them; and after great labor they disgorge it, and spend an hour in the endeavor to crack it by repeated blows with their bills. They were manifestly thieves, and I had not much respect for them; but the squirrels, though at first shy, went to work as if they were taking what was their own. Meanwhile also came the chickadees in flocks, which, picking up the crumbs the squirrels had dropped, flew to the nearest twig, and, placing them under their claws, hammered away at them with their little bills, as if it were an insect in the bark, till they were sufficiently reduced for their slender throats. A little flock of these tit-mice came daily to pick a dinner out of my wood-pile, or the crumbs at my door, with faint flitting lisping notes, like the tinkling of icicles in the grass, or else with sprightly day day day, or more rarely, in spring-like days, a wiry summery phe-be from the wood-side. They were so familiar that at length one alighted on an armful of wood which I was carrying in, and pecked at the sticks without fear. I once had a sparrow alight upon my shoulder for a moment while I was hoeing in a village garden, and I felt that I was more distinguished by that circumstance than I should have been by any epaulet I could have worn. The squirrels also grew at last to be quite familiar, and occasionally stepped upon my shoe, when that was the nearest way.
注释摘要
这段关于蓝松鸦、山雀与松鼠的描写，初看只是冬日喂食动物的闲笔，实则是一幅仔细排过座次的道德寓言。梭罗用半蒲式耳未成熟的甜玉米作诱饵，吸引来的却不是平等食客，而是一个被他悄悄分了等级的小社会。蓝松鸦出场最晚，叫声刺耳，行动鬼祟，老远就暴露行迹，姿态上一副偷偷摸摸；它们捡的是松鼠掉落的玉米粒，心急之下囫囵吞下太大的一粒，卡住喉咙，得费老大劲吐出来，再花上一个钟…