Chapter 10

Years slide by, erasing living memory of the Rebellion for most animals. The farm expands and prospers materially, but only pigs and dogs benefit. Promised retirements never occur, and Snowball and Boxer fade from memory. Squealer extols administrative “labours,” while ordinary animals toil, hungry and uncertain whether life has improved.

Despite hardship, the animals sustain pride in running the only animal-owned farm and cling to Major’s dream. Squealer then isolates the sheep for a week to teach them a new chant. Soon after, the animals witness pigs walking on two legs, with Napoleon upright and bearing a whip. As shock gives way to potential protest, the sheep drown it out with “Four legs good, two legs BETTER!”

Clover leads Benjamin to the barn wall; he reads the commandments, now reduced to a single maxim: “ALL ANIMALS ARE EQUAL BUT SOME ANIMALS ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS.” The pigs openly adopt human habits—whips, clothes, tobacco, newspapers—and install modern conveniences, normalizing their dominance.

A week later, neighbouring farmers tour the farm and praise its discipline and frugality. That evening, the animals spy a banquet where Mr. Pilkington toasts the pigs’ efficiency, likening their “lower animals” to human “lower classes.” Napoleon reciprocates, renounces “Comrade,” buries the boar’s skull, removes the hoof-and-horn from the flag, and restores the farm’s name to Manor Farm.

As the card game resumes, a quarrel erupts when Napoleon and Mr. Pilkington both play an ace of spades. Watching through the window, the animals realize the pigs’ faces are indistinguishable from the humans’. The Rebellion’s ideals are fully betrayed as ruler and oppressor become one.