Английский с Редьярдом Киплингом. Рикки-Тикки-Тави

The air was full of all the night noises that, taken together, make one big silence – the click of one bamboo stem against the other, the rustle of something alive in the undergrowth, the scratch and squawk of a half-waked bird (birds are awake in the night much more often than we imagine), and the fall of water ever so far away. Little Toomai slept for some time, and when he waked it was brilliant moonlight, and Kala Nag was still standing up with his ears cocked.

Little Toomai turned (Маленький Тумаи повернулся), rustling in the fodder (зашуршав в фураже), and watched the curve of his big back against half the stars in heaven (и посмотрел на изгиб большой спины, напротив = закрывавшей половину звезд на небе), and while he watched he heard

(и, пока смотрел, услышал), so far away that it sounded no more than a pinhole of noise pricked through the stillness (так далеко, что это прозвучало = показалось ему не более, чем шумом = звуком булавочного отверстия = укола булавки, проколотого = пронзившего безмолвие; pin – зд.: булавка; pinhole – булавочное отверстие; to prick –

/у/колоть, проколоть, прокалывать), the “hoot-toot” of a wild elephant («хуут-туут» дикого слона).

All the elephants in the lines jumped up as if they had been shot (все слоны рядами вскочили на ноги, точно в них выстрелили; to shoot – стрелять), and their grunts at last waked the sleeping mahouts

(и их мычание, наконец, разбудило спящих магутов; grunt – хрюканье; ворчанье, мычание), and they came out and drove in the picket pegs with big mallets (и они вышли и стали вколачивать колья большими колотушками; to drive in – вбивать, вколачивать /столбы, гвозди/), and tightened this rope and knotted that till all was quiet (затягивать веревки и завязывать узлы, пока все не стихло; to tighten – сжимать

/ся/; затягивать/ся/; tight – плотный; тугой; to knot – завязывать узел; knot – узел; quiet – тихий, бесшумный).

Little Toomai turned, rustling in the fodder, and watched the curve of his big back against half the stars in heaven, and while he watched he heard, so far away that it sounded no more than a pinhole of noise pricked through the stillness, the “hoot-toot” of a wild elephant.

All the elephants in the lines jumped up as if they had been shot, and their grunts at last waked the sleeping mahouts, and they came out and drove in the picket pegs with big mallets, and tightened this rope and knotted that till all was quiet.