英語聽書《白鯨記》第801期

For blacks, the year's calendar should show naught but three hundred and sixty-five Fourth of Julys and New Year's Days. Nor smile so, while I write that this little black was brilliant, for even blackness has its brilliancy; behold yon lustrous ebony, panelled in king's cabinets. But Pip loved life, and all life's peaceable securities; so that the panic-striking business in which he had somehow unaccountably become entrapped, had most sadly blurred his brightness; though, as ere long will be seen, what was thus temporarily subdued in him, in the end was destined to be luridly illumined by strange wild fires, that fictitiously showed him off to ten times the natural lustre with which in his native Tolland County in Connecticut, he had once enlivened many a fiddler's frolic on the green; and at melodious even-tide, with his gay ha-ha! had turned the round horizon into one star-belled tambourine. So, though in the clear air of day, suspended against a blue-veined neck, the pure-watered diamond drop will healthful glow; yet, when the cunning jeweller would show you the diamond in its most impressive lustre, he lays it against a gloomy ground, and then lights it up, not by the sun, but by some unnatural gases. Then come out those fiery effulgences, infernally superb; then the evil-blazing diamond, once the pinest symbol of the crystal skies, looks like some crown-jewel stolen from the King of Hell. But let us to the story.

因?yàn)閷?duì)黑人說來，在他們的日歷上，一年三百六十五日，天天都是七月四日和新年。所以如果我把這個(gè)小黑人寫成個(gè)精神煥發(fā)的人物，請(qǐng)別見笑，因?yàn)榧词故呛谏臇|西，它本身也有光澤，如其不信，請(qǐng)看一看那種鑲嵌在國王密室里的光閃閃的黑檀木細(xì)板吧。不過，比普熱愛生活，熱愛那種穩(wěn)妥安全的生活。所以當(dāng)他不知怎么一來，竟弄得讓人家誘進(jìn)了那種膽戰(zhàn)心驚的行當(dāng)里時(shí)，可就大大地?fù)p傷了他的煥發(fā)精神了。我們不久就可以看到，為什么他這樣一時(shí)間遭到挫傷，結(jié)果就注定要讓一陣奇特的狂焰照得如火般紅，以至于傳奇式地顯出了十倍于他在康涅狄格州的托蘭郡（據(jù)百周年紀(jì)念版注：這地方曾經(jīng)是裴廓德族居住的一個(gè)地方，作者在這里故意用作為比普的故鄉(xiāng)。）老鄉(xiāng)的天生的光澤來。他從前在故鄉(xiāng)的草地上，在情調(diào)綺麗的黃昏時(shí)分，曾經(jīng)以他那快活的哈哈大笑，為多少提琴手的狂奏助過興，把四周的大地都化為一個(gè)星光閃爍的小手鼓。因此，雖然那種掛在青筋暴出的脖子上的純水色的金剛鉆，在光天化日之下，也會(huì)發(fā)出正常的光輝來；然而，如果那個(gè)狡猾的珠寶商，為了要對(duì)你顯出金剛鉆的最令人感動(dòng)的光澤，而把它放在陰暗的角落里，然后，不是用太陽光，而是用一種非天然的煤氣燈光把它一照，那么，它所露出來的那種如火如荼的光輝，卻是再嚇人也沒有的了；于是那塊如放魔光的金剛鉆，那塊一度是水晶宮里的最為神妙的標(biāo)志，就象是從閻羅王那里偷來的冠寶了。不過，我們還是言歸正傳吧。

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