英语听书《白鲸记》第9期

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 Euroclydon, nevertheless, is a mighty³ pleasant zephyr⁴ to any one in doors, with his feet on the hob quietly toasting for bed. 

" In judging of that tempestuous wind called Euroclydon," says an old writer of whose works I possess the only copy extant" it maketh a marvellous difference, 

 whether thou lookest out at it from a glass window where the frost is all on the outside, 

 or whether thou observest it from that sashless window, where the frost is on both sides, 

 and of which the wight Death is the only glazier." True enough, thought I, as this passage occurred to my mindold black letter, 

 thou reasonest well. 

 Yes, these eyes are windows, and this body of mine is the house. 

 What a pity they did not stop up the chinks and the crannies though, and thrust in a little lint⁵ here and there. 

 But it's too late to make any improvements now. 

 The universe is finished; the copestone is on, and the chips were carted off a million years ago. 

 Poor Lazarus there, chattering⁶ his teeth against the curbstone for his pillow, and shaking off his tatters with his shiverings, 

 he might plug up both ears with rags, and put a corn cob into his mouth, and yet that would not keep out the tempestuous Euroclydon. 

 Euroclydon! says old Dives, in his red silken wrapper( he had a redder one afterwards) pooh, 

 pooh! 

 What a fine frosty night; how Orion glitters; what northern lights! 

 Let them talk of their oriental summer climes of everlasting⁷ conservatories⁸; give me the privilege of making my own summer with my own coals. 

 But what thinks Lazarus? 

 Can he warm his blue hands by holding them up to the grand northern lights? 

 Would not Lazarus rather be in Sumatra than here? 

 Would he not far rather lay him down lengthwise along the line of the equator; yea, 

 ye gods! go down to the fiery⁹ pit itself, in order to keep out this frost? 

 Now, that Lazarus should lie stranded¹⁰ there on the curbstone before the door of Dives, this is more wonderful than that an iceberg¹¹ should be moored¹² to one of the Moluccas. 

 Yet Dives himself, he too lives like a Czar in an ice palace made of frozen sighs, 

 and being a president of a temperance society, he only drinks the tepid¹³ tears of orphans¹⁴. 

 But no more of this blubbering now, we are going a whaling, and there is plenty of that yet to come. 

 Let us scrape the ice from our frosted feet, and see what sort of a place this" Spouter¹⁵" may be. 

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