动物的美好故事

Bell the cat
给猫系上铃铛

Now the VOA Special English Program Words and Their Stories.
Our expressions today all contain the word cat. “To bell the cat” means to do something dangers, something that might end in disaster.

The expression comes from an old story. A family of mice could not live at hole to get food because of its fear of a cat. The mice decided to tie a bell around the cat’s neck. The bell would ring as the cat moved. So the mice would always know where the cat was. All agreed it was a wonderful plan. That is until one wise old mouse asked, “Who will bell the cat?”
Another cat expression is “to grin like a Cheshire cat.” Many people have read those words in the book “Alice Adventures in Wonderland” by British writer Lewis Carroll. In the story a little girl named Alice finds a cat smiling or grinning from ear to ear. She is very surprised. She does not know cats can grin. “Ah,” she is told, “this cat is special; it comes from Cheshire”