評論
打印
My Companion Coretti
朋友可萊諦
Sunday, 13th.
星期日，13號。
My father forgave me; but I remained rather sad and then my mother sent me, with the porter's big son, to take a walk on the Corso. Half-way down the Corso, as we were passing a cart which was standing in front of a shop, I heard some one call me by name: I turned round; it was Coretti, my schoolmate, with chocolate-colored clothes and his catskin cap, all in a perspiration, but merry, with a big load of wood on his shoulders. A man who was standing in the cart was handing him an armful of wood at a time, which he took and carried into his father's shop, where he piled it up in the greatest haste.
父親饒恕了我了，我還悲著。母親送我出去，叫我和門房的兒子到河邊去散步。兩人在河邊走著，到了一家門口停著貨車的店前，聽到有人在叫我。我回頭去看，原來是同學可萊諦。他身上流著汗正在活潑地扛著柴。立在貨車上的人抱了柴遞給他，可萊諦接了運到自己的店里，急忙堆在一起。
"What are you doing, Coretti?" I asked him.
“可萊諦，你在做什么？”我問。
"Don't you see?" he answered, reaching out his arms to receive the load; "I am reviewing my lesson."
“你看不見嗎？”他把兩只手伸向柴去，一面回答我。“我正在復習功課哩！”他接著說。
I laughed; but he seemed to be serious, and, having grasped the armful of wood, he began to repeat as he ran, "The conjugation of the verb--consists in its variations according to number--according to number and person". And then, throwing down the wood and piling it, "according to--according to the time--according to the time to which the action refers." And turning to the cart for another armful, "according to the mode in which the action is enunciated."
我笑了，可是可萊諦卻認真地在嘴里這樣念著：“動詞的活用，因了數——數與人稱的差異而變化——”一面抱著一捆柴走，放下了柴，把它堆好了：“又因動作起來的時而變化——，”走到車旁取柴：“又因表出動作的法而變化。”
It was our grammar lesson for the following day. "What would you have me do?" he said. "I am putting my time to use. My father has gone off with the man on business; my mother is ill. It falls to me to do the unloading. In the meantime, I am going over my grammar lesson. It is a difficult lesson to-day; I cannot succeed in getting it into my head.--My father said that he would be here at seven o'clock to give you your money," he said to the man with the cart.
這是明日文法的復習。“你要我怎么辦呢？”他說。“我真忙啊！父親因事出門去了，母親病了在床上臥著，所以我不能不做事。一邊做事，一邊讀著文法。今日的文法很難呢，無論怎樣記，也記不牢。——父親說過，七點鐘回來付錢的哩。”他又向運貨的人說。
The cart drove off. "Come into the shop a minute," Coretti said to me.
貨車去了。“請進來！”可萊諦說。
I went in. It was a large apartment, full of piles of wood and fagots, with a steelyard on one side.
我進了店里，店屋廣闊，滿堆著木柴，木柴旁邊掛著秤。
