综英3-02_Why_My_Great-uncle_Gave_Up_the_Ministry.ppt

Why My Great-uncle Gave Up the Ministry The following sad but true tale concerns my great-uncle, a wonderful, jolly, beloved man who was over six feet four and probably weighed close to three hundred pounds. He was also well-educated and in the early 1900s became a full-time Baptist minister. A kindly, gentle man despite his size, Uncle Alden Bentley’s only real fault seemed to be that he was terribly clumsy. As a young minister, he was paying a pastoral call one day on a woman in Dillon, South Carolina, when he inadvertently sat on her Chihuahua, Twinkie, and killed it *. As the lady searched for and called for her dog throughout the house, Uncle Alden felt underneath his hip and, realizing what he had done, panicked and slipped the dead dog into his coat pocket. Although he was devastated, he could not bring himself to tell the woman what had happened *. Five years later, he returned to the same home for an overnight visit and resolved to unburden himself by finally telling the woman exactly what had happened to Twinkie. She had just had the guest room prepared and had hung brand-new curtains. To make Uncle fell welcome, she had placed on the bedside table a large pitcher of ice water and a glass, as well as a pen and a bottle of ink, so he could work on his sermon before retiring. Uncle liked to sleep with the window open and got up in the night to open it. As he did, he knocked over what he assumed to be a full glass of water. Then groping along the walls in an unsuccessful search for the light switch, he retraced his steps several times before raising the window and settling back on the bed for the night *. When he opened his eyes the next morning, he was horrified. The fresh wallpaper on two walls was covered with great black blobs. The crisp white curtains were thoroughly smudged with the prints of Uncle’s huge paws. It has not been the water glass he’d overturned during the night – it has been the ink bottle.