100个儿童英语小故事: A Silver Shilling's Journey 一枚银先令的旅程

（单词翻译）

043 A Silver Shilling's Journey

"Wow, how exciting! I am coming out into the broad world!" A Silver Shilling that was just made a moment ago shouted for joy tinkling¹ and jingling² herself. Passing through children's warm and moist hands, stingy men's cold and sticky hands, and poor husbands' and wives' hands far and wide, the Silver Shilling's journey went on.

One day, the Silver Shilling happened to enter into one wallet, but the owner didn't even know the Silver Shilling was in his wallet. The owner travels around the world very often. Incidentally, he found the Silver Shilling, and said, "What, it is a shilling from my country. You came this far with me, so let's travel together."

So now, the Silver Shilling came to be with many foreign coins. Other coins were coming in and out of the wallet, but the Silver Shilling stayed. The Silver Shilling started to feel very important.

The Silver Shilling stayed in the wallet for a long time, and she became curious about the outside world. She was looking out of the wallet while the wallet was opened, but then she fell down to the ground. She was no longer able to continue her journey with the owner.

In the end, the Silver Shilling came to a new wallet with unfamiliar³ coins in an unfamiliar country. What she heard as soon as she came out of the new wallet with the other coins was shocking. "This is an imitation. It is forged." When she heard this, her body trembled.

'I was made of pure silver in the Mint Bureau. I am a silver shilling that can tinkle⁴ and jingle⁵! Isn't the seal on my body real?' However, the Silver Shilling was abused as an imitation from that moment on. She was used only in the dark night because the Silver Shilling was a valueless imitation in that country when she would be discovered in the day.

"Even if I am made of silver, and engraved⁶ with the King's portrait, it's no use. Oh, what bad luck!" Whenever she came out of wallets, the Silver Shilling started to be afraid of people's eyes. Then one day, a poor woman laborer⁷ got paid with the Silver Shilling.

As she found out that no one accepted the Silver Shilling, she made a hole in the coin, tied a string to it and gave it to a child of her neighbor as a gift. The child smiled and kissed the Silver Shilling but peace did not last very long.

The mother of the child wanted to test how lucky the Silver Shilling was, to see if the Silver Shilling was the true 'lucky amulet⁸'. The mother put the Silver Shilling into vinegar, which turned it green, closed up the hole of the Silver Shilling, and rubbed it carelessly to make it look as if there was no hole, she waited until it got dark, and than she bought a lottery⁹ ticket in exchange for the Silver Shilling.

There were so many people buying lottery tickets at the ticket box that no one recognized the hole in the Silver Shilling. The next morning, the Silver Shilling was proved as an imitation, and again, the Silver Shilling had to continue her journey deceiving other people. For one year and one day, the Silver Shilling wandered from one hand to another, and one wallet to another.

For that time, the Silver Shilling lost her faith that she was a real coin. One day, she was in one traveler's hand and heard that she was an imitation again. The traveler fingered the Silver Shilling and muttered to himself, "I got this coin as change."

The traveler looked at the Silver Shilling carefully and said with a big bright smile. "What, this is a silver shilling from my country. Someone made a hole on this precious and real silver coin and tried to make it look like an imitation. That's interesting. I will keep this carefully and bring it home."

This traveler was the owner who let the Silver Shilling travel around the world with other foreign coins before. When the Silver Shilling heard that she was a precious and real silver coin, she was very happy. The traveler wrapped the Silver Shilling up with soft and white paper and kept it carefully separate from other foreign coins.

The Silver Shilling came back to her hometown where everybody knows that she was made of pure silver and that the engraving¹⁰ on her body was the portrait of the King. Even though there was a hole in her body, it was not important for the real Silver Shilling. The Silver Shilling's journey of pain and ordeal¹¹ ended there teaching her 'the triumph of justice'.