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But what have they done? They have taken as their model a brick set on end. This they have converted into a thing of dingy clapboards with a narrow, low-pitched roof. And the whole they have set upon thin, preposterous brick piers . By the hundreds and thousands these abominable houses cover the bare hillsides, like gravestones in some gigantic and decaying cemetery. On their deep sides they are three, four and even five stories high; on their low sides they bury themselves swinishly in the mud. Not a fifth of them are perpendicular . They lean this way and that, hanging on to their bases precariously . And one and all they are streaked in grime, with dead and eczematous patches of paint peeping through the streaks.
可是，他們實際上是怎么做的呢?他們把直立的磚塊作為造房的模式，造出了一種用骯臟的護墻板圍成的不倫不類的房屋，屋頂又窄又平，而且整個地安放在一些單薄的、奇形怪狀的磚垛上。這種丑陋不堪的房屋成百上千地遍布于一個個光禿禿的山坡上，就像是一些墓碑豎立在廣闊荒涼的墳場上。這些房屋高的一側約有三四層，甚至五層樓高，而低的一側看去卻像一群埋在爛泥潭里的豬玀。垂直式的房屋不到五分之一，大部分房屋都是那樣東倒西歪，搖搖欲墜地固定在地基上。每幢房屋上都積有一道道的塵垢印痕，而那一道道 垢痕的間隙中，還隱隱約約露出一些像濕疹痂一樣的油漆斑痕。
Now and then there is a house of brick. But what brick! When it is new it is the color of a fried egg. When it has taken on the patina of the mills it is the color of an egg long past all hope or caring. Was it necessary to adopt that shocking color? No more than it was necessary to set all of the houses on end. Red brick, even in a steel town, ages with some dignity. Let it become downright black, and it is still sightly , especially if its trimmings are of white stone, with soot in the depths and the high spots washed by the rain. But in Westmoreland they prefer that uremic yellow, and so they have the most loathsome towns and villages ever seen by mortal eye.
偶爾也可以看到一幢磚房，可那叫什么磚啊!新建的時候，它的顏色像油煎雞蛋，然而一經工廠排放出來的煙塵熏染，蒙上一層綠銹時，它的顏色便像那早已無人問津的臭蛋一樣了。難道一定得采用這種糟糕的顏色嗎?這就與把房屋都建成直立式一樣沒看攀要。若是用紅磚造房，便可以越古老陳舊越氣派，即使在鋼鐵城鎮中也是如此。紅磚就算被染得漆黑，看起來還是能夠使人悅目，尤其是如果用白石鑲邊，經雨水一洗刷，凹處煙垢殘存，凸處本色外露，紅黑映襯，更覺美觀。可是在威斯特摩蘭縣，人們卻偏偏喜歡用那血尿般的黃色，因此便有了這種世界上最丑陋不堪、最令人惡心的城鎮和鄉村。
