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He broke off. "I don't think this is interesting you.
他忽然打住了。“我認為這不會使您感到有趣。
The rest will interest you even less.
其余的部分就更引不起您的興趣了。
There are no ideas in it, and I wish that I had not troubled you to come. We are too different, mother."
其中沒有什么思想意念，我真希望當初我不麻煩您來。我們太不相同了，母親。”
She told him to continue. "It was evening before I climbed the bank.
她叫他繼續講下去。“我還沒有爬上岸邊，就已是傍晚了。
The sun had very nearly slipped out of the sky by this time, and I could not get a good view.
這時太陽差不多已經溜出天外，我不能看到清晰的全景。
You, who have just crossed the Roof of the World,
您，剛剛跨過世界屋脊的人，
will not want to hear an account of the little hills that I saw – low colourless hills.
不會要聽我說我所看到的那些小山的——那些矮矮的、色彩暗淡的小山——
But to me they were living and the turf that covered them was a skin,
不過對我來說，它們是活生生的，那覆蓋著它們的草根土乃是它們的皮，
under which their muscles rippled, and I felt that those hills had called with incalculable force to men in the past,
在這層皮下，它們的肌肉如同細浪般地波動著，我也感到，那些小山在過去曾經以不可估計的力量召喚著人們，
and that men had loved them. Now they sleep – perhaps for ever.
人們也曾經熱愛過它們。現在它們沉睡著——說不定永遠睡下去。
They commune with humanity in dreams.
它們在夢里同人類交談。
Happy the man, happy the woman, who awakes the hills of Wessex.
那在威賽克斯山中醒來的男人是幸福的，那在威賽克斯山中醒來的女人也是幸福的。
For though they sleep, they will never die."
即使他們沉睡著，他們會永遠不死的。”
His voice rose passionately.
他的說話聲激動地高昂起來。
"Cannot you see, cannot all you lecturers see, that it is we that are dying,
“難道您看不到，難道所有像您這樣的演說家們都看不到，就要死亡的正是我們，
and that down here the only thing that really lives in the Machine?
而在下面這里，唯一活著的東西就是那大機器嗎？
We created the Machine, to do our will, but we cannot make it do our will now.
我們創造了大機器，是來執行我們的意志，可是現在我們卻無法使它執行我們的意志。
It was robbed us of the sense of space and of the sense of touch,
它已經奪去了我們的空間意識和我們的觸覺官能，
it has blurred every human relation and narrowed down love to a carnal act,
它抹煞了人與人的種種關系，并及把愛情貶低到性行為，
it has paralysed our bodies and our wills, and now it compels us to worship it.
它癱瘓了我們的身體和意志，現在又迫使我們崇拜它。
The Machine develops – but not on our lies. The Machine proceeds – but not to our goal.
大機器發展著——但不是按照我們的路線。大機器前進著——但不是走向我們的目標。
We only exist as the blood corpuscles that course through its arteries, and if it could work without us, it would let us die.
我們存在著，只不過像流過它的大動脈的一些血球，要是它沒有我們也能工作的話，它就會讓我們死掉。
Oh, I have no remedy – or, at least, only one – to tell men again and again
呶，我沒有什么補救的辦法——也可以說，至多只有一個辦法，就是反復地告訴人們，
that I have seen the hills of Wessex as Alfrid saw them when he overthrew the Danes.
我已經看見了威賽克斯的那些小山，就像阿爾弗里德在他打垮丹麥人的時候看到了它們那樣。”
"So the sun set. I forgot to mention that a belt of mist lay between my hill and other hills, and that it was the colour of pearl."
“這時太陽落下去了，我忘記提到的是，一條迷迷朦朦的霧帶平鋪在我所在的那座山頭和別的山頭之間，它是珍珠色的。”
He broke off for the second time.
他第三次突然停了下來。
"Go on," said his mother wearily.
“講下去吧。”他母親疲憊地說。
He shook his head. "Go on. Nothing that you say can distress me now. I am hardened."
他搖了搖頭。“繼續說下去吧。你現在說不出什么能夠使我心煩意亂的東西了。我已經變得堅強起來。”
"I had meant to tell you the rest, but I cannot: I know that I cannot: good-bye."
“我原來有意把其余的一切都合訴您，不過我不能：我知道我不能的。再見吧。”
Vashti stood irresolute. All her nerves were tingling with his blasphemies. But she was also inquisitive.
瓦西蒂站著猶豫不決。她的全部神經被他那番褻瀆話弄得震顫著。但她還經受打聽打聽。
"This is unfair," she complained. "You have called me across the world to hear your story, and hear it I will.
“這是不公道的，”她抱怨說。“你叫我橫跨整個世界來聽聽你的經歷，那我就—‘定得聽聽。
Tell me – as briefly as possible, for this is a disastrous waste of time – tell me how you returned to civilization."
告訴我——盡可能地簡短些，因為達簡直足時間的慘重浪費——告訴我，你怎么回到文明里來的。”
