英語聽書《白鯨記》第824期

At length, when the last pint is casked, and all is cool, then the great hatchways are unsealed, the bowels of the ship are thrown open, and down go the casks to their final rest in the sea. This done, the hatches are replaced, and hermetically closed, like a closet walled up.

最后，待到裝完了最后一桶，所有的油都冷卻了的時候，就打開許多大艙口，讓這艘船的肚皮敞開來，把許多大桶給滾到它們海里的最后的休憩所去。這樣做完以后，又關(guān)上艙口，而且象是一間堵塞的儲藏室一般，給密封起來。

In the sperm fishery, this is perhaps one of the most remarkable incidents in all the business of whaling. One day the planks stream with freshets of blood and oil; on the sacred quarter-deck enormous masses of the whale's head are profanely piled; great rusty casks lie about, as in a brewery yard; the smoke from the try-works has besooted all the bulwarks; the mariners go about suffused with unctuousness; the entire ship seems great leviathan himself; while on all hands the din is deafening.

在捕抹香鯨業(yè)中，這樁事情，也許是各種捕鯨工作中最為重大的事件之一。今天，船板上都涌著奔流似的血和油；在那神圣不可侵犯的后甲板上，也大韙不敬地堆起許多碩大的鯨頭塊；到處散置著許多生銹的大桶，好象一個釀酒廠的作場；煉油間的濃煙把所有的舷墻都熏黑了；水手們滿身浸透油質(zhì)，走來走去；整艘船就象是只大鯨；各方面的轟轟嚷嚷聲弄得耳朵都要聾了。

But a day or two after, you look about you, and prick your ears in this self-same ship! and were it not for the tell-tale boats and try-works, you would all but swear you trod some silent merchant vessel, with a most scrupulously neat commander. The unmanufactured sperm oil possesses a singularly cleansing virtue. This is the reason why the decks never look so white as just after what they call an affair of oil. Besides, from the ashes of the burned scraps of the whale, a potent lye is readily made; and whenever any adhesiveness from the back of the whale remains clinging to the side, that lye quickly exterminates it.

可是，一兩天后，你往四下一瞧，在這艘船里豎起耳朵來聽吧！要不是還有那種小艇和煉油間的物證的話，你準(zhǔn)會斷定是走上了一艘冷清清的商船，船里還有一個極其整潔的船長呢。未加工的抹香鯨油本身就有一種非常干凈的特點。這也就是在他們做完了所謂油事后，甲板顯得比前更加雪白的道理了。此外，燒過了的鯨渣灰就是現(xiàn)成的富有效力的鹼水；隨時發(fā)現(xiàn)船舷上還粘有鯨脊的殘渣，鹼水就立刻把它消滅了。

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