英语听书《海底两万里》第330期 第23章 珊瑚王国(27)

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　　These valuable mollusks stick to rocks, where they're strongly attached by a mass of brown filaments² that forbids their moving about.  这些宝贵的软体动物粘附着岩石，它们被那些棕色的纤维结实地缚在石上，摆脱不开。

　　In this respect oysters are inferior even to mussels, to whom nature has not denied all talent for locomotion³. 从这点来看，珍珠贝甚至于不如谈菜，因为大自然还给淡菜有可能移动的能力。

　　The shellfish Meleagrina, that womb for pearls whose valves are nearly equal in size, has the shape of a round shell with thick walls and a very rough exterior⁴.  杂色小纹贝，所谓珍珠母的两片介壳差不多相等，壳作圆环形，壳壁很厚，外表很粗，凹凸不平。

　　Some of these shells were furrowed⁵ with flaky, greenish bands that radiated down from the top. These were the young oysters.  有些珍珠母的外壳上面带一条一条的淡青色线纹，线纹尽头处有些发亮。这是属于年轻一类的珍珠母。

　　The others had rugged⁶ black surfaces, measured up to fifteen centimeters in width, and were ten or more years old. 别的珍珠母，表面上粗一点，黑一点，有十岁以上的年龄了，宽大可以到十五厘米。

　　Captain Nemo pointed⁷ to this prodigious⁸ heap of shellfish,  尼摩船长用手指给我看一大堆小纹贝，

　　and I saw that these mines were genuinely inexhaustible, since nature's creative powers are greater than man's destructive instincts.  我了解这个宝藏是采不尽的，因为大自然的创造力远远胜过人类的破坏本能。

　　True to those instincts, Ned Land greedily stuffed the finest of these mollusks into a net he carried at his side. 尼德·兰行使他的这种本能，急急把那些最好的珍珠贝塞到他身边带着的鱼网中。

　　But we couldn't stop. We had to follow the captain, who headed down trails seemingly known only to himself.  但我们不能停步。我们要跟着船长走，他好像沿着只有他才认得的小路走去。

　　The seafloor rose noticeably, and when I lifted my arms, sometimes they would pass above the surface of the sea. Then the level of the oysterbank would lower unpredictably.  水底地面显然上升，我的胳膊有时候举起来，伸出在水面上了。其次，岩脉的水平面也任意地低下来。

　　Often we went around tall, pointed rocks rising like pyramids.  我们时常绕着切为一根一根的四角锥形的高大岩石走过去。

　　In their dark crevices⁹ huge crustaceans¹⁰, aiming their long legs like heavy artillery¹¹, watched us with unblinking eyes,  在岩石的阴暗凹凸的地方，有粗大的甲壳动物，长长的爪架起来，好像一门大炮，眼睛不动，盯住我们。

　　while underfoot there crept millipedes, bloodworms, aricia worms, and annelid worms, whose antennas¹² and tubular tentacles¹³ were incredibly long. 在我们脚下，爬着无数的多须鱼、藤萝鱼、卷鱼类和环鱼类，它们在那里特别伸长它们的触角和卷须。

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