El patito feo (inglés)

- The Ugly Duckling -

Once upon a time . . . down on an old farm, lived a duck family, and Mother Duck had been sitting on a clutch of new eggs. One nice morning, the eggs hatched and out poppedsix chirpy ducklings. But one egg was bigger than the rest, and it didn't hatch. Mother Duck couldn't recall laying that seventh egg. How did it get there? TOCK! TOCK! The little prisoner was peckinginside his shell.
"Did I count the eggs wrongly?" Mother Duck wondered. But before she had time to think about it, the last egg finally hatched. A strange looking duckling with grey feathers thatshould have been yellow gazed at a worried mother. The ducklings grew quickly, but Mother Duck had a secret worry.
"I can't understand how this ugly duckling can be one of mine!" she said to herself,shaking her head as she looked at her lastborn. Well, the grey duckling certainly wasn't pretty, and since he ate far more than his brothers, he was outgrowing them. As the days went by, the poor uglyduckling became more and more unhappy. His brothers didn't want to play with him, he was so clumsy, and all the farmyard folks simply laughed at him. He felt sad and lonely, while Mother Duck did herbest to console him.
"Poor little ugly duckling!" she would say. "Why are you so different from the others?" And the ugly duckling felt worse than ever. He secretly wept at night. He felt nobody wantedhim.
"Nobody loves me, they all tease me! Why am I different from my brothers?"
Then one day, at sunrise, he ran away from the farmyard. He stopped at a pond and began to question all the otherbirds. "Do you know of any ducklings with grey feathers like mine?" But everyone shook their heads in scorn.
"We don't know anyone as ugly as you." The ugly duckling did not lose heart, however, andkept on making enquiries. He went to another pond, where a pair of large geese gave him the same answer to his question. What's more, they warned him: "Don't stay here! Go away! It's dangerous. There...