Cao Chong weighs an elephant曹沖稱象
Cao Chong was the son of Cao Cao.曹沖是曹操的兒子。
One day, Sun Quan sent Cao Cao a present. It was a huge elephant.一日，孫權送給曹操一個禮物——一頭大象。Cao Cao wanted to find out the weight of the elephant.曹操想知道大象的重量。
「What a huge animal it is! Can anyone tell me how to weigh it?」 he asked the crowd around him.「好大的動物！誰有辦法把這頭大象稱一稱有多重？」他問他周圍的人。
「Can we get a large scale?」 asked a soldier. However, no one could find a scale large enough.一個士兵問「能給我們一個大秤嗎？」。但是，沒有人能找到一個足夠大的秤。
「Can we cut it up?」 asked another soldier. 「No. I don't want to kill it,」 said Cao Cao.另一個士兵問「我們能把它切開嗎？」曹操說：「不，我不想殺了它。」
Just then, young Cao Chong had a wonderful idea. 「I can weigh the elephant!」 he said 「let me have a try.」這時，年幼的曹沖有了主意「我能稱象。」他說。「讓我試試。」
Cao Chong asked some soldiers to lead the elephant onto a boat.曹沖讓一些士兵把大象帶到一艘大船上。As the heavy animal walked onto it, the boat went lower into the water.當這個龐大的動物走上船時，船在水中下沉了。Cao Chong drew a line on the side of the boat to mark how low it went.曹沖在船的一邊上畫了一條線，來標記水面所達到的位置。The elephant was then taken off the boat and the boat was filled with rocks until it went down again and water reached the line on the boat.接下來把大象趕下船，給船上裝載石頭，直到水面再次達到做標記的位置。Cao Chong then weighed the rocks. He added up the weight of all the rocks and said, 「This is the weight of the elephant.」曹沖接下來稱了那些石頭的重量，他把所有石頭的重量加起來然後說：「這就是大象的重量。」Cao Cao was very happy with his son. 「My son is very clever, isn't he」 he said. Everyone agreed.曹操深為他的兒子而感到高興。「我的兒子很聰明，不是嗎？」他說到。眾人紛紛表示贊同。