評論
打印
FROM THE APENNINES TO THE ANDES.
六千英里尋母
(Monthly Story.)
（每月例話）
Many years ago a Genoese lad of thirteen, the son of a workingman, went from Genoa to America all alone to seek his mother. His mother had gone two years before to Buenos Ayres, a city, the capital of the Argentine Republic, to take service in a wealthy family, and to thus earn in a short time enough to place her family once more in easy circumstances, they having fallen, through various misfortunes, into poverty and debt.
幾年前，有一個工人家的十三歲的兒子，獨自從意大利的熱那亞到南美洲去尋找母親。這少年的父母因遭了種種不幸，陷于窮困，負了許多債。母親想賺些錢，圖一家的安樂，兩年前到遙遠的南美洲的阿根廷共和國首府布宜諾斯艾利斯市去做女仆。
There are courageous women--not a few--who take this long voyage with this object in view, and who, thanks to the large wages which people in service receive there, return home at the end of a few years with several thousand lire. The poor mother had wept tears of blood at parting from her children, the one aged eighteen, the other, eleven; but she had set out courageously and filled with hope. The voyage was prosperous: she had no sooner arrived at Buenos Ayres than she found, through a Genoese shopkeeper, a cousin of her husband, who had been established there for a very long time, a good Argentine family, which gave high wages and treated her well.
到南美洲去工作的勇敢的意大利婦女不少，那里工資豐厚，去了不用幾年，就可積幾百元帶回來。這位苦母親和她十八歲與十三歲的兩個兒子分別時，悲痛得幾乎要流血淚，可是為了一家生計，也就忍心勇敢地去了。那婦人平安地到了布宜諾斯艾利斯，她丈夫有一個從兄在那里經商，由他的介紹，到該市某上流人的家庭中為女仆。工資既厚，待遇也很親切，她安心工作著。
And for a short time she kept up a regular correspondence with her family. As it had been settled between them, her husband addressed his letters to his cousin, who transmitted them to the woman, and the latter handed her replies to him, and he despatched them to Genoa, adding a few lines of his own. As she was earning eighty lire a month and spending nothing for herself, she sent home a handsome sum every three months, with which her husband, who was a man of honor, gradually paid off their most urgent debts, and thus regained his good reputation. And in the meantime, he worked away and was satisfied with the state of his affairs, since he also cherished the hope that his wife would shortly return; for the house seemed empty without her, and the younger son in particular, who was extremely attached to his mother, was very much depressed, and could not resign himself to having her so far away.
初到時，她常有消息寄到家里來。彼此在分別時約定：從意大利去的信，寄交從兄轉遞，婦人寄到意大利的信，也先交給從兄，從兄再附寫幾句，轉寄到熱那亞丈夫那里來。婦人每月工資十五元，她一文不用，隔三月寄錢給故鄉一次。丈夫雖是做工的，很愛重名譽，把這錢逐步清償債款，一邊自己奮發勞動，忍耐一切辛苦和困難，等他的妻子回國。自從妻子去國以后，家庭就冷落得像空屋，小兒子尤其戀念著母親，一刻都忘不掉。
But a year had elapsed since they had parted; after a brief letter, in which she said that her health was not very good, they heard nothing more. They wrote twice to the cousin; the cousin did not reply. They wrote to the Argentine family where the woman was at service; but it is possible that the letter never reached them, for they had distorted the name in addressing it: they received no answer. Fearing a misfortune, they wrote to the Italian Consulate at Buenos Ayres to have inquiries made, and after a lapse of three months they received a response from the consul, that in spite of advertisements in the newspapers no one had presented herself nor sent any word. And it could not have happened otherwise, for this reason if for no other: that with the idea of sparing the good name of her family, which she fancied she was discrediting by becoming a servant, the good woman had not given her real name to the Argentine family.
光陰如箭，不覺一年過去了。婦人自從來過了一封說略有不適的短信以后，就沒有消息。寫信到從兄那里去問了兩次，也沒回信來。再直接寫信到那好人的雇主家里去，仍不得回復。這是因為地址弄錯了，未曾寄到。于是全家更不安心，終于請求駐布宜諾斯艾利斯的意大利領事代為探訪。過了三個月，領事回答說連新聞廣告都登過了，沒有人來承認。或者那婦人以為做女仆為一家的恥辱，所以把自己主人的本名隱瞞了吧。
