英语听书《白鲸记》第272期

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Merchant ships are but extension bridges; armed ones but floating forts;  商船不过是桥梁的延伸;兵舰不过是浮动炮台;

even pirates and privateers, though following the sea as highwaymen the road.  甚至在海上游弋的海盗船和私掠船,虽然象拦路大盗在大道上打劫一样,

they but plunder² other ships, other fragments of the land like themselves, without seeking to draw their living from the bottomless deep itself.  在海上打劫,它们只劫掠别的船只,拦路大盗也象海盗船和私掠船那样只在别的地段上劫掠,决不妄图到这无底的深渊里来谋生计。

The Nantucketer, he alone resides and riots on the sea; he alone, in Bible language, goes down to it in ships;  于是,单独住在海上,在海上骚扰的便只有南塔开特人了;按照《圣经》上的说法,他们是单独坐船下海的;

to and fro ploughing it as his own special plantation³.  把海洋当作他们的特有的农场往复地耕耘着。

There is his home;  那里是他们的家;

there lies his business which a Noah's flood would not interrupt, though it overwhelmed all the millions in China.  他们的事业就在那里,这种事业不是挪亚的大洪水所妨碍得了的,虽然大水会淹没中国的无数生。

He lives on the sea, as prairie cocks in the prairie;  他们住在海上,犹如野雉之生活于大草原中;

he hides among the waves, he climbs them as chamois hunters climb the Alps.  他们隐伏在惊涛骇浪中,他们攀登巨浪,一如羚羊猎户之攀登阿尔卑斯山。

For years he knows not the land; so that when he comes to it at last,  多少年来,他们不知道有陆地;因此,等到他们终于来到陆地,

it smells like another world, more strangely than the moon would to an Earthsman.  它就象是另一个世界的味道,比穴居人看到月亮还要觉得希奇。

With the landless gull⁴, that at sunset folds her wings and is rocked to sleep between billows;  象无地可容的海鸥,每当夕阳西下就卷起两翼,躺在浪涛中晃来晃去地睡着了;

so at nightfall, the Nantucketer, out of sight of land, furls his sails,  南塔开特人也是这样地在薄暮时分,远离陆地,卷起风帆,

and lays him to his rest, while under his very pillow rush herds⁵ of walruses⁶ and whales. 躺下来休息了,而在他们的枕头底下,却正是川流不息的海象群和鲸群。

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